CHAPTER 35 The 'Munie' Soldier

"Birdies?" Rowan's voice came through the radio. Just at the right time as well, since Mae, George, and Flor had just detached from the larger group. "Are you out of range?"

"We are, Rowan. Go on," said Mae to the radio.

"Well, Henry and I just met Abraham, William's dad." Rowan paused for a second, but soon she added. "Betrayal plan might be possible. He can open the scanners on all floors. Even the Tests Room, Sublevel Three where they keep the Immunes, and the laboratories."

The radio's beep announcing that the message was over appeared, and a sudden silence took over the three remaining members of Group S outside the city. They exchanged looks, not needing to say a word to understand the other's thoughts. In fact, the same thought appeared in their minds, forcing them to turn to the rest of the group, who chatted rather animatedly on the opposite side of the church. They were all friends and family. If the three of them could go on, even if it could be considered a betrayal, and finish the plan without getting any of them involved, shouldn't they take it? It was for everyone's protection, or that they told themselves.

Reality, which none of the soldiers dared to accept, was different from that. It was only for their own protection—from losing anybody else, from watching anyone else they cared about die. They were only protecting themselves as they always did, refraining from ever accepting any outside help.

"Birdies." Mae turned the radio on immediately, not needing a second glance to know George's and Flor's convictions. "We'll be there in twenty minutes. Inform me when you find Bea and Leen. Don't go looking for anybody just yet. Stay somewhere safe until we get there."

"Sure will." And the beep went off again.

"Betrayers, huh? I bet Janson and Paige would be proud," George tried to joke.

"Yeah, and The Commander will be prouder when we kill them," added Flor, patting George's back as she and Mae got up. "Come on, we have to sneak out now that they're all distracted."

What was real? What was not? Was he awake or in a simulation? The Tests Room seemed just as he remembered it, though it could be a simulation of it—wouldn't be the first time they did that. And his bad leg, they could have realised his method to determine reality from simulation and use it against him. Nothing could really assure him that he was in the 'real world', to put it in a way, much less the very recent memory that he couldn't shake off his mind.

Teresa had appeared. Completely out of nowhere to add up. One moment the doors were closed, sealed like they always were, and the other she appeared with no explanation. Although, perhaps there was an explanation, the mind control just hadn't let her have a single word in before it forced him to pull the trigger. Fortunately, in case he was, in fact, awake, which was close to impossible considering Teresa was most likely dead, someone had saved her. A masked soldier appeared just like her, out of nowhere, and pulled her out of the bullet's trajectory before running out of the room.

The bullet was still embedded in the wall where Teresa had once stood. If only he could approach it, touch it to make sure it was real, he could feel calmer. Nevertheless, he could also touch things in full-fledged simulations if they were thoroughly planned out, which meant that even if he touched it, nothing would change the fact that he still wouldn't be able to discern reality from simulation.

"Five."

The voice wasn't a child's, but a teenager's, another impossible thing. William turned around, this time out of his own free will, letting him meet Dennis's wobbly figure. His face was covered in purple, the veins so prominent that they blended together under the dim light in the Tests Room. It was a bizarre sight, more so taking into account that Dennis had been dead for six years.

"Two… what…?" William asked, outright baffled at his late friend's appearance.

Dennis had never been used before in simulations, not with him, at least. William had remembered not long ago those days during Group S tests, back when their families were utilised to make them suffer in the worst ways possible. The first time Dennis appeared in front of Rowan was a year before his death, which apparently their Commander enjoyed since using the dead or even alive comrades became quite the usual thing after that. Still, Rowan's most frequent apparitions were no other than her two brothers—the one she lost at a young age, and the one who was still alive, working for WICKED as if they weren't the principal cause of their suffering.

"Missed me, birdie?" Dennis asked with a wide smile, tainted black by the dried blood in his mouth.

"What are you… You should be dead. You died like six years ago," William said, still as baffled as before, though this time it was directed at his body's, most likely, temporary freedom.

"Died." Dennis chuckled bitterly as he began to walk around the Tests Room without a care, as if that place had never been the fuel to their nightmares. "I think you meant 'killed'. You killed me Five. I think it's time you accept that."

"No, I didn't pull the trigger, Two. I swear I didn't. It was the Commander," William defended himself quickly, which was surprising.

Why was he trying to defend his position? Sure, he hadn't pulled the trigger, but he hadn't stopped the Commander from killing his friend. Who cared that Dennis was infected? They could have let him in a Crank City—let him live the rest of his days however he pleased. However, for a soldier-trained child no older than eleven, that could perfectly be considered worse than death.

"How are you so sure that you didn't pull the trigger?" Dennis asked in such a passive voice that gave William little time to keep up with his emotions.

His friend's voice was so dull, like he was talking about somebody else's death, not his own. How could the doctors do that? Couldn't they just let Dennis rest in peace? Why create an older version of his friend just to torture him? Why torture him at all? The mind control had proven to be efficient. He couldn't go against it, that was it. Couldn't they just leave him alone? It didn't matter if that meant death. William's only hope was for the simulations to end.

"Because that's what I used to do," he replied in a shaky voice. "I went against orders when nobody else could. I defied whoever told me to put those I loved in danger."

"And now?" Dennis carried on making questions, amusement creeping up in his expression. "What do you do now?"

William stayed quiet for a minute, not wanting to reply but knowing if he didn't, the mind control would force him. "Kill the simulations of my loved ones. They're dead too. You—well, the real you—might have met them already."

"Aris," said Dennis with a smile. "Your father, your mother, Newt, Sonya, my brother, my sister… Who else did you kill? Oh, yeah, Chuck and Siggy. Every single soldier in our group. And… Gally, wasn't that his name? Let's see… who else?"

"Everyone I've ever met, really," William said, his eyes detaching from Dennis' figure to stare at the floor. "Everyone I've ever cared for or even loved."

"Hmm." Dennis nodded along, getting increasingly closer to him, though still maintaining a fair distance between them. "So what you'll do now that everyone you love is dead? You'll join us? I bet my sister misses you. Ever since the two of you met you have been good friends."

"Yeah, being good friend material runs down in your family." William had to blink a couple of times to snap out of his surprise. What was he even doing? Why was he joking around with the simulation of his dead friend? Was he finally going crazy? "Why are you here, Two? Am I supposed to kill you?"

"I'd say so." Dennis placed his hands on his hips with a light huff. "That's what you said you do now, isn't it?"

"Yeah…"

There was a deafening gunshot, but, just like six years ago, it wasn't his own. Dennis fell to his knees, both hands over his stomach as his shirt tainted a deep crimson red. Behind his dying body stood the Commander. William disregarded his presence and ran the best he could to his friend, trying to place a hand over the wound and the other over Dennis' shoulder. Both hands, however, trespassed the body, confirming what, deep down, William hadn't wanted to accept. Dennis was no more than a simulation. His friend hadn't survived the bullet six years ago, nor could he have survived the Flare for such a long time.

"Get up this instant, soldier. You weren't trained to let emotions take over your actions," ordered the Commander.

"Why? Why are you doing this to me?" William asked, keeping his trembling hands in the slightly cold and currently glitching simulation despite his bad leg begging him to get up. "Is this another one of those damned tests?"

"Oh, no, those ended a month ago, soldier," said the Commander in a rather light tone to what William was used to. "The fact that you followed orders and jumped off the Maze wall completed my research."

"So why am I still here?" William insisted.

The Commander turned to look at him, or rather, his helmet turned in his direction. "The cure's research. People are fickle, but they haven't been pushed to their limit yet. Our only salvation isn't some cure Doctor Paige can't even seem to get close to, but an army of mindless Munie soldiers. We need to eradicate all Cranks. Now more than ever. The Flare is airborne."

"And my existence is important… where?" William wobbled to his feet the moment Dennis' simulation completely evaporated.

"Now." The Commander clasped his hands together, and William could almost depict a mocking grin playing across his face. "You see, there's something you misinterpreted. Teresa is alive. We just cut your connection with her. After all, I couldn't have her destroying all I've been working for these past ten years, could I?"

"She's alive?" William mumbled, more to himself than to anybody else.

"Yes, she is," affirmed the Commander.

"Then… it was her… I-I almost killed her."

"You didn't, though," The Commander approached him decisively, squeezing his shoulder as if to comfort him. "And for that mistake, she'll betray you."

"What—" Before William could finish his question, the Commander went ahead and answered.

"I overheard a conversation she had with Doctor Paige. They're desperate. The Bliss doesn't work, the infected surpass the healthy, and the Cranks are getting violent more quickly." The Commander took off his helmet, as if for the fact of being able to see his expressions William would believe him more easily. "They're going to stop the research on the cure. They'll send all their precious Munies to me, to turn them into the perfect soldiers, to eradicate the Cranks that are threatening our existence."

"I still don't know why I'm relevant. I'm not Immune," William said.

"Oh, you might not be a Munie, alright, but your two friends are. How did WICKED name them again?" The Commander left the helmet by a nearby metallic table and got back, a hand under his chin, as if truly going over his memories of whoever he was talking about. "Minho and Dennis, wasn't it? Well, at least I'll be able to put Dennis, or, as you know him better, Soldier S2, to work right away. After six years and a prolonged stay in Group C's Maze Trials, I'm not sure if he'll be as good as he once was, but I'll still have fifty other Munies to take his place if he dies out there."

"Dennis and Minho are dead. You can't possibly use corpses," said William.

"They're very much alive, soldier," replied the Commander.

"That can't be. It's impossible." William's grip on the gun tightened without him realising, as if a stronger force, outside the mind control, was taking over his body. "I saw Dennis die, and Minho…"

"WICKED pulls these kinds of tricks all the time, soldier. I'm rather disappointed that you didn't see through them." The Commander folded his arms, looking at William's soldier uniform up and down. "I see you don't remember, so I'll be brief. Teresa did not only betray you. Minho was brought along with the both of you, and he has been tested on and tortured ever since he got taken."

"Minho is…" William trailed off his whispering as he realised Dennis's survival explanation had been left out. "What about Dennis? I saw him die. He had purple veins on his face. Even if he had survived when you shot him, he'd be dead by now."

"That's where WICKED's inefficiency plays off. Most of you—Group S—came to WICKED in batches. From Soldier S1 to Soldier S9, you all came together. After all, you had already been assigned as Test Subjects for Maze's A and B. Unfortunately for S2, his results were mistaken with ones from a future comrade you'd have." A smirk played across the Commander's face, as if he was enjoying the reactions William had at the brand-new information. "S2 was and is, contrary to all of you, a Munie."

"No, it's impossible. He had the Flare symptoms," William pointed out, growing rather tired of the conversation. "I saw the veins, and the eyes were losing focus…"

"Of course." The Commander nodded with the smirk still present on his face. "And only a minute ago you saw him again, right? Soldier, six years ago, was, just like today, a simulation. After all, did S2 ever get close to you that day, or anybody for that matter? Did he pick anything up? Didn't you notice, by the time he was lying on the ground, supposedly dead, that you were all rushed out of the Tests Room before he disappeared?"

The memories of that day replayed with a clarity they had never before. He remembered little of Dennis that day, but he knew his friend wasn't acting as usual. There were few days that the Commander allowed them all to be together, no walls separating them, while carrying out the tests, but, the few times they could, he always stood next to Rowan, his sister. That day he didn't. He was as far from anybody as he could get. And, even when Dennis attacked him, he never got physical, though he had wrestled Henry or Mark for less in their quarters.

"No."

Like telling him 'I told you so', the Commander raised his arms only to let them fall at his sides, making a slight clinking noise that snapped William out of his shock. "Of course, once S9 got infected, we had to run tests to make sure the rest of you weren't infected. And then we found it out. You can't imagine my surprise when Paige came to me, claiming that I had a Munie within my experiment soldiers. She asked for him back and even proposed an exchange. The Subject who got S2's place for the Munie Soldier, quite the odd trade."

"Who took Dennis' place?" asked William, too astounded at the news to worry about anything else.

"S32," replied the Commander as if it were nothing, as if the child was nobody to him. "I think WICKED had named him Audie, but It doesn't really matter any longer, does it? And, sincerely, I'm disappointed in you, soldier. You're not asking why I'm not using your number when referring to you? Do you perhaps know already? Or do you have a hunch and fear my answer?" William wanted him to shut up right there. He didn't want to know what followed. He didn't want to hear it. But, of course, the Commander didn't care for a second what he wanted. "You're the only one left, soldier. The betrayal saved you and Minho, but it killed everyone else."

That alone shattered William's heart to pieces. Minho, Teresa, and he were the only survivors. Whatever had happened between the Maze escape and the betrayal had eradicated dozens of people—friends and family between them. They had lost it all, and yet they were still suffering under WICKED's grip. Why couldn't they just end it all? Could they ever be free? Would WICKED ever let them be free?

"It's ironic. Your existence doomed all Group S right until the end—until their very own deaths," commented the Commander lightly, his eyes glancing from William to the gun. "I'd say it's about time you break that curse you carry on your shoulders, isn't it, soldier? Teresa, the one who betrayed everyone you cared for, the one who doomed you to keep living and suffering, let her find your body. Let her suffer just as much as you have until now. Make her pay."

For a second, only for a second, the words made sense to William. The idea alone of ending it all was appealing to him. He wanted to stop suffering, to stop killing and following orders like he wasn't just a scared kid that wanted and needed nothing more than a shoulder to cry on. But, as if an angel was looking out for him, Teresa's, Dennis', and Minho's faces appeared in his mind—perhaps younger than what they would currently be, but still them.

He couldn't end his life. Not then. Three of his friends were still alive, under WICKED's influence in one way or another. Just like him. Everything that had happened to them—the formation of their groups, their tests, the kills, the losses—was WICKED's and the Commander's doing, nobody else's. It had always been them; picking kids and putting them in the worst situations possible. Just to get the results they desired, which turned out to be for nothing—their suffering had turned out to be for nothing.

It didn't matter any longer. His group had had constant nightmares that didn't let them sleep, anxiety attacks and breakdowns that had once been as common as yawns, and many had even died—and all of that was for nothing.

After all that, after all the constant suffering, that phrase appeared, practically written on the walls as if WICKED's doctors were trying to keep their consciences clear. "It's all a means to an end," William mumbled. "What a shitty end it is."

"Speak up if you have something to say, soldier," ordered the Commander.

"You did this to us." William locked eyes with the man—not The Commander, not a doctor, just a scared man that instead of hiding his fear under the cure's long-term research to end the problem, preferred to take the shortcut of killing the problem. "You chose us for your experiment, just like WICKED did with the Immunes. I didn't kill my friends, you did. It was always you who pulled the trigger. Because you were afraid, weren't you? You were afraid of us."

"Soldier, shut up," the man ordered, with little effect.

"No," William said, his rage showing through his voice and eyes while raising the gun. "You didn't want to turn into a Crank. You were so scared that you would turn into one that you sent us off to kill any in your way. You killed the ones who got infected, and you kept the rest of us locked away after any infection. I didn't get to see Newt off because of you! He died before I could…" With his free hand, William quickly wiped off the tears that had started to bottle up in his eyes, trying not to break down while threatening the reason for his worst nightmares. "Teresa isn't to blame, and neither am I. You didthis to us. You, Ava Paige, and all WICKED. We shouldn't be getting blamed for anything. You should."

"Soldier, think about what you're doing. You're not in your right mind. Emotions aren't for you, that's why the mind control is important. You can't handle them. Nobody in Group S could—"

"Don't worry,"—William racked the slide of his gun—"your death won't give me any emotions to deal with."

And so William pulled the trigger, keeping his promise until the light disappeared from the man's eyes. After that, an emotion completely new to him appeared. Calmness, utter and unexplainable peace.

A shocking revelation came to him as he stared at the body—he was free.

The doors were open, and he could kill whoever got in his way to the outside. He was closer, more than ever, to freedom. And yet he couldn't leave. Not alone. He had three people to find, neither of which he knew exactly where they were. But he had an idea of at least one. If Teresa was working for WICKED, there was a high chance he would find her wherever the laboratories were.

Of course, nobody would answer a random kid's question, much less when said kid had blood splattered on his sleeves and part of his face. A soldier would have better chances. So he put on the dead man's helmet, stole his jacket to cover the blood on his own suit, and disregarded the pain in his leg to drag the body towards a blind spot in the Tests Room.

Then, as if what he left behind had no longer any meaning to him, William walked out of the Tests Room with his slight limp and began his search for the laboratories.

Sublevel three had fewer guards than expected, and they were, overall, simple to take down. To some, the stunning guns weren't even necessary, but it was a quicker way to get the fighting over as soon as possible. Once the guards were on the floor, twitching and turning like bugs, Leen and Flor were then assigned to completely knock them out.

Mae watched the Immune's cells open one by one as Rowan and George tried to get all the Immunes to trust in them, which was difficult when one of them was still wearing a guard suit, and the other wore a hood and mask to conceal his identity.

"Where's Minho?" Leen asked, seeing as the last cell had been opened, but her brother was nowhere to be seen.

Although there was someone who definitely stood out as the Immunes got out of the last cell. It was a boy, probably no older than seventeen or eighteen, who looked awfully similar to Rowan. However, some features resembled somebody else, which none of the seven soldiers could yet place in the number of faces they knew.

"Yeah, we'll worry about that"—Rowan pointed at the mysterious boy—"later."

"Well," Abraham began to talk by the screens, many tabs open from which Mae could only figure out the one for the cameras, which had just started to glitch, "you might want to add a worry to that list. My son's not in the Tests Room. The cameras picked him up, all dressed up like a guard, getting out of there just five minutes ago."

Then, to nobody's actual surprise, Thomas's voice appeared by the entrance, where three guards, Chuck with a poor disguise and a helmet, and Teresa stood. He was looking directly at Teresa, or so it appeared, since he was still wearing his guard's helmet. "You think you could get in the system to find him and Minho?"

"I can try," replied Teresa, quickly joining Abraham's side by the screens.