Author's note: And just like that, it's been three years.

Chapter 52. The Second Escape.

Monday morning finally brightened, and Thomas seized the first opportunity to leave the cocoon of sleepless worrying. This was only exchanging one challenge for another, with the vast majority of the people involved in the escape confused and looking to him for answers. Their red herring strategy wouldn't work as well if WICKED knew Thomas was keeping information from the others. They would keep a closer eye on them, and be more sceptical of their intel. Of course, the Gladers didn't understand the plans that were kept secret from them. They didn't say anything, but everyone was trying to meet his eyes, brows raised or furrowed, and in either case on full display for cameras. Thomas glared at them with as much meaning as he dared.

It was not enough. There was little point in shutting down the reaction he had been unable to prevent. And what had already happened the previous evening —what had he been thinking, letting it be so obvious? Anyone watching them could tell that something was going on, and not in the way Thomas wanted them to. An excuse, then.

Newt caught his eye, looking as concerned as Thomas felt, and an idea was born.

"It's a bit early, but there's no point hanging here like we're waiting for the buggin' box," Newt said to the group. "Let's go to breakfast." He nodded to Thomas as they both waited for the others to file out of the room.

Minho joined them at the back of the swarm, yawning loudly. "What's with all the stares? They all looked at you like you were a Griever."

"Beats me," Thomas said. "Maybe something about what I said last dinner. They looked sort of nervous afterwards."

"Whole evening, really," Newt agreed.

There was silence. There wasn't supposed to be. Thomas looked at Minho, waiting for him to say his line, but his friend had his chin clenched in unwillingness.

"Come on, Minho, just say it."

Minho sighed. "I was... tired yesterday, and my arm hurt. What happened during dinner?"

"We were talking about what's gonna happen after we leave," Thomas said.

"Which we do every day. Go on."

"And I said —more like thought out loud— that maybe we should try to make some place of our own out there. Plenty of ruins to repair once it's safe."

"And why did Thomas' crappy idea turn them into a flock of skittish chickens?" Minho looked at Thomas. "Yeah, Shank, I mean that. The Cranks don't go away the second there's a cure, and the cured people could become bandits destroying small villages."

"Because," Newt said. "They thought he meant we're going out there to some empty space in the woods in the middle of winter and staying there."

"And they don't seem to understand me when I tell them we're not doing that."

"It's not like we haven't followed your madness before, Tommy. If you told us then and there 'we're living in this abandoned village now', I don't think I'd stop ya, and then the wild animals would eat our frozen corpses."

"How dumb do you think I am?" Seeing Minho about to answer, Thomas quickly continued. "We don't know how things work out there. We'd have to figure it out and plan carefully before taking a risk."

"Did you say that to the shanks in front of us?" Minho wondered.

"I tried. It'll settle itself before we leave. There's still loads of time left."

Had that worked? It was not a lie, but was it understandable and more likely than the other possibility? Probably not. He would have to sell it stronger.

Thomas delayed at breakfast for as long as he dared, waiting for Emma the guard to show up. She would not be happy to see him after bailing on their agreement, and though she was unlikely to accuse him of anything in from of people, she might give it away through other means. He would have to get to her as soon as possible to prevent any mistake. WICKED couldn't know to what extent Thomas had misinformed his own allies, or they would understand that their escape hinged on him and a handful of others. They would become immediate targets if somebody caught on before they made it out, and their efforts would be for nothing. On the other hand, if WICKED's spies believed everyone was more or less on the same page, they would overhear and coax more false information from the group.

The Gladers had pulled themselves together during their walk to the cafeteria, and looked remarkably casual throughout the meal. The Glenners appeared some time afterwards, and some of the tension left Thomas' gut upon seeing them act normal. He nodded at Harriet, who had received his message about the excuse they were using to cover up the false escape plan of that morning. He heard a few girls whispering about his ideas of their settlement after leaving the base. Harriet and Sonya had done their parts well.

Thomas had meant to strengthen the act by addressing the topic in front of everybody, but the Gladers were all done eating, and some had already left. Reshaping his plans, Thomas went into the corridors with Minho and Gally, leaving Newt to talk to his sister. The trio was headed to the library for the next part of the ploy.

To Thomas' annoyance, the other two were arguing with each other.

"It's a pretty dumb idea," Gally said.

"The only dumb thing here's your shuck face, Gally," Minho retorted.

"What's even the point of taking off the cast? If you say it's 'cause it looks ugly—"

"If a Crank appears out of nowhere, what'll it see?" Minho waved the arm stiffly. "A target."

"That's a target you can make a trap of. They run at you—"

"And you'll protect me? You'd let it kill me."

"If it kept you from interrupting all the time. Besides, I've only seen one Crank in this place. If there were more running around, we'd have heard about it by now. Why not wait until the day we leave?"

Careful now. Gally didn't seem to be thinking about what he was saying, or that he might hint at their escape.

"And leave with an arm I haven't used in weeks? That's even dumber than your face."

Gally was about to answer, but just then another person walked into their corridor. It was Emma, moving almost listlessly with a tired scowl on her face. As she saw them, she sped up, though she was marching in the same direction as them.

"Hey, Emma!" Thomas called after her.

She paused reluctantly, waiting for the Gladers to catch up.

"Did you get a chance to read the collection?" He asked.

She scoffed. "Not a lot to do on the night shift. I read it a bunch of times."

"Did you see my notes?"

"Yeah, you don't get poetry at all."

"Well, we were about to hang out in the library. Unless you're busy, you could come with us and tell me why I 'don't get poetry at all'."

"I think it'd be easy enough for you to figure out… But I was going to the library to return the book, so fine, I can give you a minute."

She ended up giving him more than a minute, and Thomas was glad he'd actually read through the book, or he wouldn't have been able to keep up.

After some minutes of nodding along, Thomas said: "Okay, how about this: I read it again, give my notes to you, and then we meet up on… Saturday morning? Or Friday evening, whatever works for you. Would that be long enough?"

"Saturday?" She regarded him skeptically over the open book.

"Do we have a deal?"

She slammed the book shut. Thomas' head shot backwards on instinct.

"I don't think you understand this," Emma said.

"Fine, give me another book and I'll try again. You said some helpful things."

"I don't think poetry's for you, Glader." With that, she went to return the book to its shelf, leaving the library immediately after.

Thomas breathed in deeply. He hadn't been anticipating… Minho was looking at him worriedly. Was she going to turn them in?

"Guess I lost my reading buddy," Thomas said.

"Too bad about your little book club," Minho shrugged.

Thomas scoffed. "That means you have to read with me instead."

"No it doesn't"

"Yes, it does," Thomas said, hoping the telepathy would make him understand.

If he'd been hoping for secret messages, he was sorely disappointed. At least he managed to calm himself while he was looking through the poetry collection with Minho. Emma didn't know anything that would be dangerous if revealed. The only risk would be if they passed her during the escape, which they likely would, but just because she was confused or whatever didn't mean she had changed her mind about leaving. Unless she wasn't just reacting to the sudden change of plans, if she'd been found out and her parents had been taken hostage to keep her from helping. But if she was trying to lure them into a trap, then she would've agreed to whatever Thomas planned.

"Honestly, it's not too bad," Minho admitted after finishing the book.

Emma and the other guards would probably come with them if they passed them in the corridors. If not…

Thomas watched as Gally put together a shelf, hitting a nail with a small hammer.

If it came to that…

The book was short, but it had taken some time to get through, and it was suddenly time to go to lunch. In the cafeteria, Thomas continued on the act from before, saying something or other about supplies, defences, and experience, which seemed to go over well enough.

As they were leaving the cafeteria for their various afternoon activities, the telepathy group appeared to be short one person, with Minho going to get his cast off, but they were surprisingly joined by Teresa, who didn't give any explanation other than a weak smile. Something was clearly off with her, looking around them with the nervousness of a thief. She was not amused by having this pointed out.

The research team was also surprised at seeing Teresa, but were quick to brief her on what they were doing.

"You haven't had the practise with the group, so the results may be lessened," said one of them. "But if we can test how you react in comparison… Yes, could be valuable data."

Teresa looked at him, then at each of the scientists, studying them carefully. "I am glad to be of help," she said mechanically.

That day they were looking into materials which would inhibit connections. It was more draining than any experiment they had done since that first night with the team that would be arrested by the chancellor for their actions. They were always asked if they were willing to proceed, but wanting to keep WICKED happy, was there an answer other than 'yes'? The worst thing was that they had Teresa communicate with them, which gave Thomas a headache. The others were affected to lesser extents, including Teresa, but rather than give up, the newly fashioned theories demanded they keep at it. Afterwards, as they were taking a walk to clear their minds, Thomas began to wonder if it had been a sign. Maybe their escape plans had been noticed after Thomas' conversation with Emma, and they were being punished.

Parting with the Glenners, Thomas walked through the section near the warehouse with Teresa and Newt.

"Now ya know what you've been missing," Newt told Teresa.

"Not sure I missed the experiments. Are they always that intense?"

"Not usually."

"How interesting."

Though Thomas had reacted the same way, her tone made him want to disagree. "It's not a sudden change. It's just a new direction that's a bit more advanced. It was different 'cause you were there, but not too much."

"That's also interesting. Maybe they don't like you leaving and are taking it out in the experiments."

"Or maybe we need to leave soon, because the experiments are getting 'interesting'. I'm all for being helpful, but we all need a break from this whole business. We've found the Cure for them, so really, our purpose is completed, and we can get back to the telepathy research later if they need to, but it's better if we do that with some firm foundations out in the world."

"How come?"

He couldn't very well say that he feared they would be held in the facility against their will once they wanted to leave, so what then?

"They're not paying us, for one," Newt said. "We need money, but we've no idea how much it's worth out there. If we go to find out we can return for actual jobs here."

"Because WICKED doesn't give us food and a roof over our heads," Teresa murmured.

"Don't you want to choose things for yourself? We're in the room they put us in, with the furniture they chose, wearing the clothes they gave us," Thomas said.

"And we're fine."

"I know you don't believe that."

Teresa shook her head. "You don't get it, Tom! We have a purpose, a duty… This is just the order of things. Newt knows what I mean, don't you?"

"We needed order to survive," Newt said. "Our rules were made for living in a trap."

"If you knew what the world was like… It's still about survival." She surveyed them angrily. "Why not just leave now? Go see for yourselves what's going on outside. I'm not keeping you. Then you can see why WICKED is good."

"We will go. We won't make you come with us if you're so sure," Thomas snapped. He meant it, too. If she thought WICKED was so great, they'd leave her with them.

Teresa scoffed, changing directions and disappearing behind a corner.

"I don't understand her," Thomas lamented. "I know she wanted to leave earlier, but now… I don't know what it is, but something's wrong."

"Might be she's just like that. She found her bloody purpose, like she said, and she'll give up her happiness to do the right thing."

"Well, now I feel guilty for wanting to leave." Thomas though for a moment. "Maybe it really is that bad out in the world, with the Flare and all that. Maybe they need us to fix it."

"Then we'll find out how to help on our own. I don't bloody care how well those… people take care of us, we deserve to be free."

They had eventually spread the message that the escape would be in the early hours of that Saturday, when they would sneak to the warehouse and take over the berg that would be making a delivery at that time.

At two thirty on the morning of Thursday, Thomas received a message from Aris.

"Harriet just left with her group," he reported.

"Alright. You guys know the timing?"

"Sonya goes in five minutes."

Thomas swallowed, trying to keep his cool. Their true plan had irreversibly begun.

Group A had three teams, and Group B had four, each led by somebody who could communicate with the other groups using telepathy. The Glenners moved first at irregular intervals of a few minutes, making sure the path was clear as they made their way to the warehouse. A few of the girls had spent time by the bergs and claimed to be capable of getting one open, which they would do as fast as possible.

Thomas lay on his back in bed, counting the minutes. He hadn't heard the message Harriet was supposed to send him as she left, but at least he'd heard Aris, who had more skill and experience using telepathy. The distance was a problem. He asked Newt and Minho if they were able to make contact with Harriet or the other girls. Minho could contact both Harriet and Ariadne, and Newt could talk with his sister. Maybe Thomas wasn't trying hard enough. It would have to work, because now it was Minho's turn to go.

Minho's group left five minutes after Aris', but the distance caused by their rooms would have them near the same spot at the same time. The Glenners would go through the corridor where the Cure was, taking out potential guards, and Minho's group would be in an adjacent corridor, ready to serve as backup if needed.

After the third group of Glenners had gone, Minho started to wake the Gladers who would go with him. If they were being spied upon, the chances of escape with the cure were slim. Their best protection was to play a part. Their act was that a few of the boys had agreed with some girls to meet up in an empty, unlocked room near the warehouse. They'd spread the rumours well enough, without specifying the date. Then the other groups would wake up some time after to 'look for their friends'.

Thomas screwed his eyes shut as he listened to Newt whispering worriedly about the missing Gladers to half the remaining group as he woke them up. The others had no idea what was happening, and acted concerned naturally. As they too left, Thomas pretended to jerk awake as the door was shut deliberately hard. He blinked slowly, closing his eyes… then he got a better look at the room and saw the empty beds. Shooting out of his bunk, he hurried to the door, making a show of looking outside. The group was gone by then, out of sight. Thomas woke the others as a second 'search party', shushing their questions.

The last person stepped out of the room, shutting the door behind him, and Thomas felt a spark of hope. He walked quickly, but with light steps. Feigning uncertainty, he chose the path that would lead them to the warehouse, taking a different path than the other groups, but staying near Newt's group in case they ran into trouble.

"Thomas, there's a problem," Aris spoke in his head. "Teresa is gone."

"When did that happen?" Thomas asked, fighting to keep his breathing down.

"Just now. She was with us —she agreed to come— but then she disappeared."

The hope soured in Thomas' throat. Had his friend betrayed them all? He'd half-expected her to go with them when the time came, but why disappear if not to tell on them? Maybe he should have done the bad thing and asked someone to knock her out and take her to the berg. If she wanted to stay so badly, why ruin things for the rest of them? She could not believe she would go unharmed as the only remaining Glader, excluding an attempt to hide as an option. The only reason would be them taking the Cure. If she didn't want them to…

"Newt? How's it going?"

He was answered by unintelligible sounds, words and syllables cut out. The only word he could distinguish was 'weird'.

He considered the group around him for a moment before leading them into a narrow corridor. It took some time for fifteen people people to cross it, but they were fast, and could soon see Newt's group through the entrance to the lab where the cure was stored. A slumped form in guard gear rested nearby. Thomas whispered for someone to check the guard for any communication device, in case he woke up. He then made them wait outside as he pushed past the people blocking the entrance to the lab.

By the front of the large room, Newt was doing something by the wall and Ben was next to him gathering papers. As Thomas got closer, he saw Teresa standing by Newt. She was saying something as Newt twisted the door to a small vault.

"Teresa?" Thomas asked in surprise.

She held up a hand, continuing to read off a list of instructions.

The door popped open, and Newt carefully lifted a rack of test tubes filled with see-through liquid from within. He pocketed three of them, giving another three to Teresa, and, upon seeing Thomas, gave him the last two.

They moved out quickly, and Teresa turned to Thomas. "Don't tell me you believed in that klunk I was saying earlier."

"I had just started to," Thomas admitted, smiling. "But why did you come here?"

"Let's just say I figured out some secret information. They wouldn't have gotten into the safe without me."

"This is a relief. I thought you'd gone to betray us."

"Good."

They had started running, nearly in the warehouse.

"Aris, is the berg ready to go?" He asked.

"Yeah. A man was waiting for us inside. A pilot. Minho knows him. He's called Jorge. Should we trust him?"

How… "Yes, trust him. Maybe not too much… Put Gally next to him."

Much as he wanted to trust Jorge, he didn't have a clue as to why he was there. Had Brenda sent him? Maybe they would be taken to the Right Arm right away. He had to—

"Thomas!" Ava Paige cried in outrage.

Thomas turned around. There she was, looking strangely impeccable. A guard stood next to her, pointing a weapon at the Gladers. It was not a launcher. He was fumbling with a walkie-talkie, speaking into it. They couldn't make a run for it. The guard would shoot. Even if it was only Thomas, he was carrying some of the Cure. They couldn't be allowed to have it.

"There is absolutely no need for violence tonight," the chancellor said. "I am very disappointed in all of you, but if this is what you want… You will give us back the cure to the Flare. Thomas, Newt, Teresa, and the others from the telepathy research group will remain. The rest of you may leave."

"I thought we all could leave when we wanted to," Thomas said. What was he going to do?

Before Paige responded, half a dozen guards appeared behind her. Emma was among them, as were some of her friends. Thomas looked at her, but she averted her gaze.

"Teresa," Paige said. "Get the Cure for me."

Thomas felt his muscles tense. Involuntarily, he extended the tube he was holding to Teresa. She moved stiffly, eyes wild, but as she stood right in front of him, taking the Cure, her blue eyes became calm and serious. She looked pointedly at his pocket, where the other tube lay, nodding almost imperceptibly. The tension had gone out of Thomas, which he realised first when his hand brushed the glass tube in the pocket. He was not being controlled, and neither was she.

He took out the second cure, mimicking the stiff gestures of the control. Teresa took the test tube before moving on to Newt. He looked confused, but complied, having understood the situation was not what it seemed.

Teresa picked one test tube out of her pocket, then another. The second was different, though. The liquid was definitely cloudy. Nobody seemed to notice. Then Teresa dropped the test tube.

The gasps of horror sounded once and then twice as white smoke billowed from the floor, rising rapidly.

"Go!" Teresa shouted. "Now!

Thomas ran. Gunshots were fired against walls and into flesh, but oddly enough, not in his direction. The guards… Emma! The guards were fighting each other. They had allies.

He knew the direction well, even though it was nearly impossible to make out wall from free air. He ushered Gladers forwards. They were nearly free.

Thomas was lying on the floor. He was unsure how he'd gotten there. His leg hurt, though he hd no idea where. He saw boot-clad feet run around him —guard boots. A boot trampled his hand, and this cleared his head somewhat. He'd been shot. The guards had moved on, thinking he was dead, or too hurt to flee. He tried to crawl across the floor, to weak to think about standing.

A pair of hands appeared from the mist, gripping his arms. He knew those hands and their gentle warmth that was trying to help him up.

"Come on, Tommy," Newt mumbled. "We're nearly in the clear."

Thomas used all his strength to get up, inching forward as fast as possible while leaning against his friend.

Something cold was pressed against Thomas' neck.

He hoped the others had made it to the berg by now and were flying to safety wit the Cure. For him and Newt, there would be no escape.