I do not own the Maze Runner Trilogy.

"We are the kids that you never can kill

You never can kill, you never can kill

You say that we won't, but you know that we will

You know that we will keep on."

—We Are the Kids by WALK THE MOON

Ruby wasn't sure how long they had walked for. Six hours? Ten? She had no idea anymore. Her watch still rested snugly on her wrist, but she refused to look at it, scared of what she might see.

Joan had grown too tired to walk, so Ruby allowed her to ride on her back as they made their way to the safe haven. Every now and then, the small girl would let out a tired sigh.

"Hey!" Sonya called. "Look over there!" She reached out her hand to point.

Following Sonya's arm, Ruby squinted to see a small cluster of people. It must have been Group A! Ruby adjusted her grip on Joan's legs. "Hold on, kiddo," she murmured as she broke into a run alongside the rest of her group.

It didn't take long before they had reached the group, but Ruby kept moving. She had to find him, she had to know if he had seen her, too. If—

She collided with a person and stumbled backwards, almost dropping Joan. An hand gripped her shoulder, keeping her steady, and Ruby looked at who the person was.

Minho.

His eyes widened frantically when he looked at her. "You—"

"Did you—" Ruby began at the same time.

They stopped and looked at each other sheepishly, waiting for the other to continue.

"Ru?" Minho finally asked, furrowing his eyebrows in nervous hope.

"Yeah," She responded with a half-smile. "Minho?"

"Yeah." He relaxed a little, his mouth quirking into a smirk. "So, you're telling me Teresa's not out to kill Thomas?"

Ruby shrugged. "Honestly, that chick seems nine kinds of crazy. I don't know what her deal is anymore, but I do trust Aris. And he said that Thomas wasn't gonna die."

Minho sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. "I guess that's as good as I'm gonna get, huh?"

"Probably," she responded, trying her best to sound sympathetic. "He'll be okay, man."

He clenched his jaw. "You'd better be right, shank."

Harriet and Sonya soon joined the small group, both eyeing Minho cautiously.

"What's going on here?" Harriet asked, authority strong in her voice.

"Just havin' a little chit-chat," Ruby responded, shrugging as she shifted Joan to keep her from slipping. "Not like he's gonna try to kill me, Harriet."

"And you know this how?" Harriet demanded sternly.

Minho snorted. "If I was gonna kill her, I'd have done it already. Besides, you crazy shanks outnumber us. I'm not that stupid."

Joan chose that moment to wake up. "Why are we out in the middle of nowhere?" She asked sluggishly as she lifted her head from Ruby's shoulder.

Ruby pulled her eyebrows closer together. "Actually, yeah, that's a good question. What's going on?"

"You haven't seen it yet?" Minho asked her, shooting her a questioning look.

Shrugging, she told him, "Nah. Care to enlighten me?"

He nodded and motioned to follow him. They walked through the crowd of people, most of whom moved out of the way as Minho walked through. He stopped eventually, looking at something in the ground. When Ruby caught up with him, her jaw dropped. She was looking at a stick shoved into the ground, with a little orange flag that waved in the strong wind. On it were thick black letters that read:

THE SAFE HAVEN

Ruby's eyes widened, and she felt her jaw drop. This was their safe haven? "It's just a stick!" She murmured incredulously.

Minho shrugged and lazily put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, it's better than nothing, right?"

"It's still a stick."

He just shrugged again. "Dunno. I don't think WICKED would go through all that effort just to let us die out here."

Joan nodded, her blonde hair accidentally whipping Ruby in the face. "I agree with him. That would be pointless."

Raising his eyebrows meaningfully, Minho said, "See? Listen to the kid, Ru. She knows what she's talking about." He paused for a moment as he looked over Ruby's shoulder, his eyes widening. "I'll be right back," he told her, giving her shoulder a pat. "Stay here."

Ruby nodded as he walked off, and she squatted, allowing Joan to slide off of her back. Brushing off imaginary dirt, she straightened up before she glanced over at Joan.

"Stay with me, kid," she told her sternly. "I don't want you out of my sight. Got it?"

Joan nodded firmly. "Oui," she replied, a determined look on her small face. The two stood side by side for a few moments, looking at the stick as if it would suddenly change into a solution for all of their problems.

Suddenly, Ruby heard Minho's voice call out, "You guys make a path!"

Turning towards his voice, she could see Minho walking through a clearing in between all the teenagers, Thomas and Teresa following closely behind. He led them to the stick, stopping next to Ruby. Thomas and Teresa shared a look before Thomas went to get a closer look. He numbly fell to his knees, seeming to feel the same shock and disbelief that Ruby had.

He turned to face Minho, who was still standing next to Ruby. "We have over an hour left," he said, glancing at his watch. "Our safe haven is a stick in the ground?"

Minho shrugged. "Wasn't so bad, when you think about it. More than half of us made it here. Looks like even more of the girlie group."

Ruby groaned a little, rubbing her face with her hands in exasperation.

"The Flare turn you crazy already?" Thomas demanded angrily as he stood up. "Yeah, we got here. Safe and sound. To a stick."

"Dude," scoffed Minho, "they wouldn't send us here for no reason. We made it in the time they gave us. Now we just have to wait until the clock ticks down and something'll happen."

"I agree," Joan said in her thick accent. "It would not make sense for them to waste so much time, and then let us die."

Teresa, Thomas, and Minho all looked at the small girl, none of them expecting her to say anything.

"That's what worries me," Thomas murmured.

"I hate to say it, but I agree with Thomas," Teresa said, tearing her gaze away from Joan. "After everything they've done to us, it'd be way too easy to have a little sign here, and then they come get us in a nice helicopter as a reward. Something bad's gonna happen."

"Whatever you say, traitor," spat Minho, not trying to hide any of the malice he felt for Teresa. "I don't want to hear another word from you." Grabbing Ruby's arm, he stalked off, Joan following close behind them.

As they walked, a girl with long, dark hair approached them, a worried look on her face. "Where's Thomas?" She asked.

Too angry to speak, Minho just jerked his head in the direction they just came from.

"He's over by the stick with Teresa," Ruby supplied.

The girl raised an eyebrow. "That chick who wanted to kill him so bad?"

"Yeah," Ruby snorted. "Dunno what her deal is, but I think she might be catchin' the Flare already or something."

The girl snickered. "I like you," she declared, sticking out her hand. "Brenda."

"Ruby," she replied, taking the older girl's hand with her free arm.

Brenda nodded, walking off in the initial direction Minho had pointed her in.

Minho sighed, moving his hand down her arm to her hand, grasping it tightly. "C'mon," he said, pulling her to the left. "There's a couple of people I want you to meet."

The people were two members of Group A, Newt and Frypan. The two were nice to Ruby and Joan; neither of them blamed the two girls for what happened to Thomas. Feeling exhausted, the small group sat on the ground, no one saying a word, just enjoying the temporary peace and quiet.

When Thomas found them, the oncoming storm had grown closer. The wind had picked up, carrying some rain with it, and the dark gray clouds nearly covered the whole sky, barely leaving any light.

"Hey, Tommy," Newt said casually as Thomas joined them on the ground.

Nodding, Thomas replied, "Glad to see you guys made it here."

Frypan snorted. "Same back at ya," he said. "Looks like you had more fun, though. Hangin' with your love goddess. Guess you two kissed and made up?"

Ruby felt something squeeze her hand tightly and looked down to see that Minho was still holding onto her hand.

"Sorry," he muttered, loosening his grip, but still not letting go.

"Not exactly," Thomas said, not noticing the interaction between the two. "It wasn't fun."

"Well, what happened?" Minho asked. "I mean, Ruby told us what she knew, but how can you trust her after all that?"

Even though he hesitated, Thomas eventually relented and recounted the story of his time with Group B: WICKED's plan for him to be killed, the camp, his talk with Harriet, Sonya, and Ruby, and the gas chamber that Teresa and Aris brought him to.

"And you forgave that little witch?" Minho demanded when Thomas was done talking. He squeezed Ruby's hand in anger and frustration again. "I won't. Whatever those shuck WICKED people wanna do, fine by me. Whatever you wanna do, fine by me. But I don't trust her, I don't trust Aris, and I don't like either one of them."

Newt was definitely the calmer one of the bunch, and Ruby could tell he was like Group A's guy version of Sonya. "They went through all that—all that planning and acting—just to make you feel betrayed? Doesn't make any bloody sense." He turned to the two girls. "Ruby, Joan. You two were with Teresa for the most part. What was she like then?"

Joan spoke up first. "She was very mean and angry most of the time. She got on with the scary white man very well, and was happy that our task was to kill you, Thomas.

"She was super bitter," Ruby recalled. "She kept talking like Thomas had killed her parents in front of her, or something. In fact, she tried her best to make your whole group seem like real awful people. Dunno how she managed to be that good of an actor. The whole thing was just pretty confusing, to be honest."

"Tell me about it," Thomas muttered spitefully. "And no, I haven't forgiven her, but for now I think we're in the same boat." He looked around at all of the teenagers that were there before he turned back to his friends. "What about you guys? How'd you make it here?"

Minho was the one who answered. "Found a gap through the mountains," he told him. "Had to fight through some Cranks camping in a cave, but other than that, no problems. Food and water's almost out, though. And my feet hurt. And I'm pretty sure another big bolt of shuck lightning's about to come down and make me look like a piece of Frypan's bacon."

Ruby rolled her eyes. "We get it, ya stick. You're a whiny baby."

Minho dropped her hand and shoved her in mock anger.

"Maybe we should bag this whole safe haven thing and try to find shelter," Thomas voiced, eyeing the cloudy sky wearily.

Newt was quick to shoot that idea down. "No way," he said. "We didn't come this far to go back now. Let's just hope the buggin' storm holds off a little longer." He looked up at the sky, too, grimacing.

The group sat in silence, with Ruby and Minho leaning on each other, and Joan resting her head on Ruby's shoulder.

Suddenly, Minho jumped to his feet, and Ruby almost fell over. "What's that?!" he exclaimed, pointing at something just behind Thomas. Ruby stood up quickly, noting the terror on Minho's face.

A little ways away, Ruby could make out a large section of the desert that was opening up. A perfect square, only a few meters wide, rose diagonally, revealing what lay under the ground. There was a patch of blackness, and something sat on top of it. The something was oblong with rounded edges and was perfectly white, which contrasted greatly with the dark environment they were in. Ruby immediately recognized it—she had seen it when her group had finally made it out of the Maze. Where the Grievers must have slept.

Did Grievers even sleep? Or was that just where they would stay, lying in wait for when they would finally be aloud out into the Maze once more? Ruby shook her head, trying not to dwell on it.

She felt Minho grab her hand once more, but before she could react, more sections of the desert ground opened up, revealing pods numerous pods identical to the first one. They circled the group, leaving no way out.

There was no escape.

A/N

Hi! I just wanted to thank everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this story! Your support means so, so much to me, and I apologize for taking so long to update! High school is really taking a toll on me at the moment. I know that's not that much of an excuse, but I really am sorry. Thank you all again for your support to this story!

Another note: I now have a Polyvore account in which I have created collections to help visualize my OC's. You should go check it out! The username is the same as it is here—candyappleredd.

Thank you all again!

Love, Nell