Nobody had come to save them.
They still hung, lifeless corpses, swinging on useless tubes, as there was nothing left to drain anymore. Dead hair curtained their shriveled faces, pale hands dangling lifelessly to their sides.
"What the hell?" Gally muttered, horror etched on every feature on his face, as he inspected the other children.
Minho stepped closely to one of the boys, any hint of who he was before completely gone. Newt put a hand on his shoulder and gently guided him forward, helplessness written on both of their faces.
Thomas approached one girl, the beeping of machines piercing the silence, and recognized the curtain of dark, dead hair shielding her face.
Rachel.
He'd have to tell Aris that she never made it out.
Suddenly, the door clanked open, and a deep voice shouted loudly, "THERE!"
Sparks rained off the metallic ceiling as the group scattered, ducking for cover as gunshots shrieked over their heads. Gally mashed himself up behind a pillar, and let streams of electricity put a layer of protection between them and the guards. Minho ducked beneath a beeping lab machine, and let out a stream of bullets, taking down the first row of guards.
But more seemed to fill their place.
Thomas crouched behind a hanging body, feeling distraught with guilt as he used a child for a shield. His own pistol took down a few guards, but there was no way they were getting past that door now.
"Anybody got a grenade or something?" Newt yelled, sheltered also behind a pillar.
As if to answer, a small circular object was thrown down the hallway, sliding precariously close to where Gally stood.
"Thanks for giving them the idea Newt!" Gally yelled exasperatingly, eyeing the blinking object. "Keep me covered!"
Minho slid out of his hiding place in front of Gally, as Gally ran out to the grenade and with an angry grunt, kicked it with all his might down the floor, before hitting a control panel 50 metres down the hall. But the motion must have triggered it, and it detonated with a flurry of sparks.
And with a mighty whoosh, it set the control panel on fire.
"Oh shit!" Newt cried, taking quickened steps away from the growing flames.
Every action in the room seemed to halt as everyone stared in shock at the fire. The electricity must have sparked with the old technology, creating an electrical fire that doubled every second. With another whoosh, it claimed the control panel next to it, and grew dangerously close to the swinging corpses next to it.
"We gotta get out of here!" Gally shouted, not caring about the soldiers any more, as many of them fled as soon as the fire started. The smoke grew hot and heavy in the airtight room, and they coughed and choked as they ran towards the exit.
But the fire was catching up with them.
The shells of the children were like perfect kindling, and Thomas could feel bile rising in his throat as he watched the fire jump from body to body. The boys in front of him suddenly stopped, and put their hands up as a couple soldiers still stood at the door, guns pointed.
"You're not getting away that easily!" A guard hissed menacingly through his mask.
"You stay here and you'll die." Newt deadpanned from the back.
"We'll die without Thomas. He is the Cure."
A loud crackle echoed from their right, but the soldiers seemed unfazed, keeping their guns upright. "Walk towards the door. But keep your hands up. And no funny business."
The doors hissed open, and Thomas and the others walked slowly out, the soldiers still standing in the flame-filling room.
"Eileen Dresnack, what's your message, soldier?" A voice crackled over one of the soldier's radios.
"Sergeant Brown, ma'am. We've captured Thomas. But a fire has broken out in Control Room-aaaarrgghh!"
The soldier's report was cut off as the fire enveloped him, and the temporary distraction caused the break they needed.
"C'mon!" Gally waved them forward, and they dashed down the metallic hallway. But the fire steadily grew around them, burning the wooden ceiling panels behind them.
"The whole bloody building's going to burn down at this rate!" Newt shouted, panic lacing his undertones.
"Less talking, more running!" Gally led the pack further down the hall, the fire like a pack of wolves on their heels. They turned a corner, which led to another set of swinging doors, which Minho barreled into, sending them swinging open fully, and crashing into the walls behind them. Thomas stopped in his tracks, as he recognized the glass partitions and beeping equipment, just barely audible over the blaring alarm overhead.
They were in the Medical Wing.
"Oh you've got to be kidding me," Minho sounded exasperated as he too halted to a stop.
"We've been going in a whole bloody circle?!" Newt asked incredulously, but a click of a gun behind them rendered him speechless.
"So. You decided to come back."
The group slowly turned, hands raised, to find themselves being held at gunpoint by a nurse, who was a little unsteady on her feet, but made up for it through the malice on her face.
Gally reached for his gun, but Clarisse flicked the gun in his direction. "Don't even think about it."
"Just let us go." Thomas stepped forward, hands up. "You too. The fire can't be stopped. This whole place will burn down. Everyone has to get out of here."
"Do you really think I'm going to let you go? I spent years trying to find a Cure, and now you're standing where I can finally get it? You think I'm going to betray my allegiance and give you up?" she sneered. She waved the gun to usher them into a glass hospital room, not unlike the one that Thomas found Newt in. With them all inside, and a turn of the lock, she left them.
The fire had seeped into the Medical Wing.
Minho threw himself against the glass, but it wouldn't break. Now matter how much force he put into it, he was only bruising his side.
"Thomas, help me with this." Minho tried to pick up the medical bureau, no doubt wanting to try throwing it through their prison walls.
The smoke was getting thicker.
"On 3...1...2...3!" With a grunt, the two threw the drawers into the doors, and it managed to splinter a crack into the glass.
The flames were larger.
The 4 boys desperately kicked and threw themselves against the glass, cracking it further, but still not creating a passageway. Gally and Minho picked up the bureau again, and with a mighty heave, shattered the door.
"Okay, c'mon, c'mon!" Thomas helped Newt through the hole, and once all of them were out, the smoke was so heavy they couldn't see. They immediately started coughing and choking, desperately looking for the way out. There were two ways they could go down the hallway, but one was consumed entirely by fire.
And the other had a soldier standing with his gun raised.
"I won't abandon my post!" he choked out, holding something in his hand, the smoke making him delirious. With a final choke, he threw the object down towards them, and collapsed. Thomas watched in horror as the thing slid towards them.
An electric grenade.
And with the fire behind them, there was nowhere to run.
This was it.
The group was rooted in place, as they knew there was no escaping death this time.
"ARE YOU CRAZY! NOT THOMAS!" As if out of nowhere, Clarisse emerged out of the smoke, leaping over the fallen soldier and diving onto the grenade. With a bang and a flash of electricity, it detonated, frying the nurse, but saving Thomas and the others.
Thomas watched in stunned silence, looking at the charred remains of the nurse who saved him.
"THOMAS! WE GOTTA GO!" Minho screamed, and Thomas leapt over both fallen people, looking back as the fire consumed the halls around him.
They ran crouched, coughing and choking on the smoke, each room they passed consumed with flames. As they passed the cafeteria, Thomas felt a twinge in his chest as they passed the picnic tables burning steadily.
Newt coughed and heaved behind him, and Thomas put a hand on his back to support him, to guide him forward. Left, left, right, another left, right. With one last turn, they ran on to the last hallway, the factory equipment sparking with flames around them, the door just 100 yards ahead.
Almost free.
"COME ON! ALMOST THERE!" Thomas sprinted with all his might to close the distance, waving his friends forward. Newt was spluttering, coughing and heaving, his legs wobbly with exertion. Gally was wheezing and clutching his chest, the smoke inhalation obviously not good on his lung. Minho was holding a burn on his arm, the result of the electric grenade, but all were running with all their strength.
50 yards.
The fire raged around them.
25.
It was closing in by the door.
10.
There was almost no room to run in between.
5.
5 more steps.
With a lunge forward, and an exerted roar, Thomas hung on the lever, pulling it down with all his might, and with a deep blaring noise, it opened, opening the doors to their freedom. They dashed out onto the sand, putting as much distance between them and the burning building as they could.
When far enough, they collapsed on the sand, coughing and choking, lungs burning.
"Everyone okay?" Minho asked, standing up and brushing himself off.
"Well as I can be." Newt stood with the help of Gally, groaning with a grimace of pain on his face.
Suddenly, a great whirring noise appeared in the sky above them.
The Berg.
"Yes!" The group cheered and hollered, watching as the airship slowly descended. They waved frantically, watching as it slowly made its way back down to the ground. It was close.
But suddenly, the crackling flames, the cheering, and the whirring of the airship was all drowned out by a louder noise.
The click of a gun.
Janson stood behind them, gun pointed at Thomas.
If he was only half-Cranked before, he was fully Gone now.
"I need it!" he yelled hysterically, his voice lilting and breaking.
The Berg had almost landed.
"Need...your...blood!" He lurched horribly forward, as if using all his strength, keeping the barrel pointed on Thomas.
"Come on!" Minho screamed up at the Berg, waving frantically to get them to land faster.
"One way...or another! Give me your blood!" Janson screamed as he stumbled forward, his eyes wild and dangerous. His neck twitched strongly, his whole body spazzing out of control. Tears leaked out of his eyes as he trembled, his voice shaking. "I need it."
But as he pulled the trigger, his arm twitched horribly, not shooting where he wanted it to go.
BANG!
And Newt dropped like a stone.
Mwahahaha...