The next two weeks were relatively calm and uneventful, except for one tiny thing.
"Sup shanks." Minho said casually as he approached the kitchen from behind. His voice suddenly shot up a pitch at the last word, making everyone within hearing vicinity turn and roar in laughter, including Newt.
Minho's voice was breaking and if it wasn't the most hilarious thing that happened this whole month, nobody knew what was.
Even Qiufeng couldn't help stifling a laugh as she turned to the rather annoyed boy. "Hey." She smiled from behind the kitchen counter as she looked up from putting plates on a tray, her eyes twinkling with amusement as the other settled down beside Newt. It was so rare to see the big and tough Minho get shut down by anything, or even flustered really, that she had to enjoy the few moments that he was out rightly embarrassed.
"I swear when it's their shucking turn to have their voice broken…" Minho growled in a low voice, trying not to trigger the break.
"Look on the bright side, you'll be the first one done when the rest of us start squeakin." Newt patted him on the back sympathetically as Qiufeng glided over with the tray.
"So who's the greenie?" She asked cheerfully as she passed over a few plates to them, effortlessly holding the tray at the same time. Today she officially graduated from being the greenie of the glade, someone else having come up in the box this afternoon. She was kept busy in the kitchen the whole time preparing for the welcome party in evening. "Dinner preparations had me busy in the kitchen this afternoon, didn't even have time to look up."
"He's a little shank." Minho said, voice cracking again. He rolled his eyes and took a deep breath as if trying to calm his frustration, and dug into the food.
"Everyone's a shank to you shuck face." Qiufeng shook her head, the glade slang coming naturally as she set down her plate in between them. Hanging out with the boys had really rubbed off her. She was about to sit down when a thought occurred to her and she clapped her hands together. "Oh remember when I said I had something to show you this morning?" She smiled widely, creating a dimple at the corner of her mouth. Her eyes were sparkling with excitement.
"Yeah?" Newt looked up from his food curiously, as did Minho.
She grinned cheekily. There was a moment as she took a breath and extended her right arm out to balance her body weight, while the other one brought her left leg high above her head. After her fight with Minho and realizing that her body was capable of much more, she carried out some experiments by herself and found out her body was extremely flexible and agile. At first she was a little bit stiff with her movements, but after enough practice she eventually got the hang of it. Now as long as she kept to some daily exercises, staying nimble would be effortless.
Minho raised an eyebrow and Newt just stared. "…Doesn't it hurt?" The blond eventually asked, and both boys instinctively brought their legs closer together.
"Surprisingly no!" She brought herself back into a standing position again with a little jump and a proud smile. "I've been testing my limits recently, and apparently I'm more flexible than I thought."
Qiufeng promptly took her plate off the log and squeezed in between the two boys, her smile never wavering. "Isn't this great? It might come in handy one day, like for avoiding bullets or something."
"The bullet would've already killed you by the time you're done performing." Minho replied dryly as he poked his fork in the air as if making a point.
"Yeah maybe if it hadn't killed you first while you're so busy yapping." She shot back quickly, and they spent a good few seconds squinting at each other before she gave in and laughed. "Okay okay seriously though, who's the Greenbean?"
Although she was glad for shedding the title of newest kid around, there was just something endearing about being new, where everyone was curious about you and cared for you in a sense even if it didn't really seem like caring. However even if she did feel a tinge of regret, she was still mostly happy. Perhaps the gladers would entrust her with bigger responsibilities now that she had upped herself a level.
"His name's Niko, small boy about the same age as us, bonded immediately with the Slicers." Newt pointed out a lanky brunet who was speaking excitedly with the slicers, hands waving wildly in all sorts of gestures across the glade. The blond frowned and continued. "Honestly, he's way too excited to be here. It kinda creeps me out, might throw him off the cliff myself."
"Nah, the only person you would hurt around here is yourself." Minho added in without thinking while stuffing his mouth. Upon realizing what he had said, he stopped suddenly and gave the other boy a half wince, half apologetic look. Qiufeng watched curiously as the blond glared at him in response and decided not to ask. It was obviously a sensitive issue by the way that Newt responded.
"Did the runners find anything this afternoon?" Newt turned back to his food, purposely ignoring what Minho had said earlier.
"That's the dumbest thing you could ask a runner, and you know that of all people." The Asian replied dryly with a roll of his eyes.
They lapsed into a quiet silence as they focused on eating, suddenly quite aware of the cries and laughter of the boys around the campfire at the back of their head. Qiufeng chewed her food slowly as the silence let her thoughts wander, wander out to the maze, through the walls and into the world beyond. They soon drifted to the brother she never remembered, and she wondered what he was doing now. What he was like, where he was, whether he know about her or if she stayed forgotten, buried under dust. Would she get to meet him if they ever got out?
Nothing ever gets through those walls, Minho had told her. But she knew better. Thoughts, hopes and dreams of a better future, of lost families and old friends. All of those had gone beyond the walls, carried by a tiny speck of faith.
"I wonder what it's like out there." Qiufeng suddenly commented as she looked up, her eyes wandering upwards into the endless blue.
Minho glanced at her. "It's really nothing much, just imagine the corridor outside times ten and all aroun-"
"No no, not the maze." The girl interrupted as she shook her head and stretched out her arm, waving over the walls into the distance. "I mean outside these walls, the world beyond."
Minho raised his eyes to the skies. "…who knows?"
"We'll find out eventually." Newt replied after a moment of silence as he too, gazed up at the twinkling stars.
Qiufeng tore her eyes away from the dizzying expanse of the sky and glanced over to her left and right at the two boys beside her. In the maze it was obvious that they had to take risks eventually, and it was almost always a matter of life and death. They were young, brash and that somehow scared her but perhaps it would be their saving grace. What about herself though? Although her confidence had been building over the past few days, what she would do in a life threatening situation she honestly didn't know.
There was a moment as a question popped into her head, so stupid it almost hurt to think about it. Her pride disapproved but her heart screamed at her for vocalization, seeking reassurance and comfort. She stared down at her plate. "…do you think we'll get out?"
Minho snorted. "Of course we will, what do you think I'm doing every day?"
"And we'll beat up the bastards that put us here." Newt nodded his head.
There was a moment as she contemplated their words and nodded with a faint smile. "We'll see it one day." She murmured she raised her arm up as if to catch the entire heavens in the palm of her hand. "Beyond the walls."
"Definitely." Newt chuckled, his eyes twinkling with renewed hope.
"Together." She clenched her fist firmly and smiled at them.
"The three of us." Minho agreed with a smirk.
Qiufeng laughed freely, a first since she stepped into the glade. "The three of us."
2 years later.
A blonde woman paced around a white tiled room surrounded by glass walls, empty except for a long glass table in the middle. She wore nothing but white, her hair tied up into a tight bun above her head. She stopped for a moment as if thoughtful, but then shook her head and continued to pace, the clicking of her heels sounding more and more frustrated as the seconds tick by.
There was a beeping sound and she took a deep breath, slowing down to stand in front of the table. She waited a moment before a large holographic screen opened up in the middle. A man stood on the other side. He had black hair that faded to grey down his sideburns.
"Subject P16 Medusa and subject P24 Cerberus have succumbed to the experiments Chancellor, their bodies were not able to adapt to the changes." He begun gravely, his hands clasped together on the table. When there was no response from the woman in white other than a head shake, he continued.
"We need your decision Chancellor." He stated calmly. "We believe that we have obtained enough study on subject P9 and P10."
The woman remained silent as she focused on something a little way to the left of the screen, tapping her fingers against the transparent table top.
"We followed your decision to leave them in the respective mazes, overlooking the mix-up two years ago even though the subjects could have been damaged." His voice grew in urgency as he leaned forward. "We must insist that you consider our proposal to avoid future incidents during The End."
She stayed silent as she took a seat, flipping through some documents that were placed on her table. Her fingers paused on a page, shifting slightly to reveal a photo of a young Asian girl with long straight hair and vacant eyes. The woman gazed at the photo for a moment before turning her eyes to the next page where another photo was clipped. An Asian boy stared into the camera with the same vacancy, bearing an uncanny resemblance to the girl from before.
"The mix-up would have never happened if your previous team wasn't slipshod in handling the subjects." She calmly replied after a moment. "We were lucky it was just one mistake."
He gritted his teeth at her humiliating words. "If you would've just kept the girl's hair as her original length it wouldn't have happened, it was an honest mistake – They're twins!"
"It was a hidden test to see if your team was competent." The woman's voice rose for a moment before falling back into a calm. "They were not, and thus not here anymore."
There was a pause before the woman spoke again. "I'm sure this is not the reason why you have called me, Director Janson."
"…we've come to a point where we scientists need a miracle, and these children named after myths are our last hope should the trials fail." The man replied slowly, standing up and leaning forward towards the screen. A giveaway sign that he was losing his cool. "P16 and 24 have already succumbed to the experiment, and there're less than thirty of these precious specimens left."
There was a moment as the woman just sat there, searching the other's face through the screen.
"Fine." She eventually said, her eyes briefly glancing down at the documents below her, over the words printed below the photo of the Asian girl. "Take them out of the maze."
Qiu Feng. Subject ID P9.
AN: Hey guys! As you can tell, things are finally picking up pace! I hope you enjoyed this chapter of Redamancy, please consider leaving a vote if you have! (:
What was your favorite part of the chapter? :D