"William, don't!" Teresa came running.
He didn't know why until he looked down. A beaten-up man was under him, dressed plainly and wearing a white coat. The man had blood running down his nose and a swollen eye.
"You don't know what he did! It was him who made Newt . . . he made . . . he . . ." tears streamed down his cheeks, falling onto the man's coat.
"This is not the way to do things, and you know it." Teresa grabbed his wrist carefully, trying to divert his attention from the doctor. "Newt's fine—alive. I promise."
"Tessa . . . Newt . . . he . . ."
"I know," she cut him off, wrapping her arms around him. "I know, Liam, I know. But he's alive. Newt wouldn't want to see you like this. Please, calm down."
"Liam!" Thomas exclaimed, running up to him and grabbing what looked like a family photo on the way. "Teresa? What happened?"
Teresa doubted, but soon she answered Thomas' question. "Liam saw Newt trying to kill himself in the maze."
William woke up, cold sweat covering most of his forehead and neck.
He didn't know how long he had slept, but he knew that the few hours he had of sleep would be the most he would have for the rest of the day. Slowly, and without making much noise, he got up and walked to the tiny bathroom inside their room.
As he turned on the light switch, the first thing he saw was a pair of blue eyes staring directly at him.
Of course, he thought. That's how the bloody reflections work.
However, the heart attack he nearly had while thinking the shadow was right in front of his eyes would surely not make going back to sleep any easier.
He buried his head under the sink, letting the running water soak his hair and head. His short, brown, wet hair fell in front of his eyes, letting him see for himself that the reflection wasn't showing him any tricks. He stopped the flow of water, pulled his hair back, and whipped his face and neck with his sleeve.
When he opened the door to get out of the bathroom, yet another surprising presence almost made him jump back. George was on the other side, unmoving, as he sat on the ground, staring at a wall like it was the most interesting thing he had seen all his life.
"Nightmares again?" George asked, raising his eyes to look at William, who nodded. "Me too."
"What happened?" William asked, sitting down on the empty seat beside him.
"This mission thingy is driving me crazy," George whispered. "I don't want to have A's and B's deaths in my conscience when we leave."
He rested a hand on George's shoulder, trying to comfort him. "No one has to die. We can save all of them."
George squeezed his hand to reassure both of them. "Only the A's and B's, though." He paused. "I just . . . if the Right Arm doesn't help us, I would rather take them down to ashes without having to condemn a bunch of kids to hell."
"We'll get through this, George," Mae said, not even attempting to whisper, as everyone else was already awake and listening to their conversation. "Besides, that's what threats are for. Trust me, those kids will be fine. We'll make sure of that."
"If not, we can always send them off somewhere before we betray the Right Arm." Flor got up from her bed, walking to the centre of the room where everyone already was, either standing or sitting around. "Like it or not, we're stuck with those kids for a while. We're bound to catch the tiniest bit of sympathy for them."
"Flor, you'll make me cry," Henry said, faking to wipe off a tear. "Such a beautiful way to see the situation."
"Oh, shut up, Henry." Bea chuckled, rolling her eyes playfully. "Anyway, we meet the groups today. Everyone ready?"
"I hope they come soon. I'm tired of waiting for them," complained Leen.
"Are we sure we want them to get here soon? Just thinking about walking in the Scorch without any protection is already burning my skin. Now add the twenty kids we'll have to protect and put up with." Rowan groaned loudly, taking a seat beside Henry on Flor's bed.
"Better out there than trapped in here," Leen pointed out, shrugging her shoulders as she sat down beside Bea on William's bed. "But I do agree that putting up with kids has never been my strong point."
"Well, at least now William will understand what dealing with Birdies feels like," George said, elbowing his friend softly as a joke.
"Just tell me you hated me when I first appeared. No need to get all riddling about it." William said in a light tone.
The group continued chatting as they waited for Janson to show up. They didn't have any watches or alarms in the room. Those were only given to them while on missions. After all, a guard would usually come to get them in the morning, so they had never needed them before.
However, as the door opened to reveal Janson, the cheerful mood ended. He eyed a paper and then raised his eyes back at the group, who had just left their previous positions to stand before him.
"Group B will be here shortly," he said and stared at the group up and down. "Do I have to repeat those who are assigned to them?"
They immediately shook their heads and turned to give a hug to the ones leaving. Bea promised Leen a million times that they would be careful, while Henry joked about forcefully shutting the B's up if they were too loud. Then, they walked out of the doors and disappeared.
George and William sat down on the latter's bed, while Leen and Rowan took a seat on Flor's bed right across from them. Somehow, despite the time they had to themselves from that point on, they preferred to be all together.
They waited for Janson to get back at any given moment, telling them to get up and get out of the room at once. But he didn't come. As nights went by, they all slept on the bunk beds right next to each other. The girls were on the left, and the boys were on the right.
On the morning of the fifth day, Janson finally appeared through the door, urging them to follow him. From the quick mutters that they achieved to hear him say, Group A was about to finish their Trials earlier than expected.
What they didn't understand was the bus waiting for them. For some reason, they didn't wait for them in the Sanctuary, like the other half of their group had done with Group B.
Through Janson's mumbles, William understood why. Group B had been attacked by the Right Arm as they tried to take them out of the maze Trials and had taken a couple of Subjects with them.
Obviously, they won't let that happen again. William thought as he followed Janson. He glanced at his sides, finding the rest of his group equally or even more confused than he was.
When Janson halted right in front of a bus, they did as well. Two armed guards were at the entrance, motioning them to get inside without saying a word. They accepted orders and walked up the couple steps to the bus, going to the backseat, where they could sit together.
The ride to WICKED would take a few hours. At least that was what they had overheard. Due to boredom, they came up with a form of zoning out pretty quickly, watching destroyed cities pass by. As if they had never been important. As if no one had ever called them home.
Somewhere between those three long hours that it took to get to WICKED, they played a game with each city they passed by; guessing how it could've looked before when everything was fine. Before whatever happened to it, did.
It was simultaneously depressing and comforting. At least, the reality did somewhat resemble their state. A living memory of what it once was, but without the means to tell its story.
The bus stopped inside a gigantic white installation. Doctor Paige — a woman with brown, straight hair, whose warm smile made all kinds of sirens blare inside their minds — received them.
"Welcome, William, Rowan, Eileen, George, you're finally here. We've been waiting for you," the woman said. "I didn't introduce myself properly before. I'm Chancellor Ava Paige. You've been told of your duty from now on regarding Group A, right?"
"What you told us. Nothing else," answered William.
Her smile widened slightly as she motioned graciously to the door behind her. "Those are important steps, of course. But for them to trust you, you must perform an action worthy of it. I'll explain more inside. Please, follow me."
They did as they were told and walked a few steps behind the woman, turning their head around to take in their surroundings. Their instincts told them to be wary. More importantly, to find an exit that they could easily access at any given point.
Chancellor Paige opened a door and motioned them to get inside. In it, there were countless screens. All of them had different angles and zooms of the same place and people. A large group of boys appeared in one. They were all looking around a garden-like place. Some things were destroyed, like a widow in a wooden structure behind them.
"Shouldn't someone give a pep talk or something?" Some boy asked.
"Go ahead," Newt said on one of the screens.
There was no mistaking the boy. From the voice on his face, that boy with blond hair was no other than Newt. And he wasn't alone. Near him, keeping a kid no older than thirteen between them, stood Teresa and Thomas.
The previous boy nodded and faced the crowd. "Be careful," he said dryly. "Don't die."
William analysed all the boys in the cameras' range, trying to find anyone else that could provoke a memory or that he could recognise. There was no luck. He could only concentrate on how some were shaking from fear or anticipation.
"That was a darn good pep talk," Rowan muttered as she walked to stand beside William.
"Great. We're all bloody inspired," Newt said, then began the true pep talk.
"You think that's the leader?" George asked in a hushed tone.
"No, he's more like the kind-hearted friend that tries to get everyone's shit together. You know, like Flor," Leen answered from Rowan's right side. "The boy from the stupid pep talk looks more like a leader."
All boys began cheering when the actual pep talk finished. Battle cries soon resonated around the screens. It didn't matter where they looked, they could only see the group of boys encouraging themselves before going straight to their probable death.
Newt thrust his weapon into the air and yelled, "Hear that, Creators! We're coming!"
"And I guess we'll be waiting for them, huh?" George questioned, slightly louder than he'd like. "Let's see how many survive that. Sincerely, I like the blondie and the idiotic pep talker. I hope they make it."
William would like to add something to his friend's statement. However, he was too stuck in his own mind. His head pounded like he wanted to remember, but couldn't. Something was there, he was sure. If there was something else to remember about Newt, or perhaps Thomas or Teresa, it was struggling to get through his mind's barrier.
A flash of light appeared in his mind, like a light switch. Something didn't quite fit in his memories, but he knew those eyes. He knew that face and way of speaking. It wasn't a carbon copy of one another, though. It was different, in a way. The voice was softer, and the accent varied.
"Is everything alright, William?" Ava Paige asked with an analysing look, which drove everyone's alarms insane once again.
"I was just wondering how we'll find them." He answered, glancing at the screens discretely to see Newt again. "Also, they don't look like they'll trust anything we say."
"As you've seen, Group A is about to complete their trials," she said with an indifferent tone that definitely suited her better than a warm smile. "When Thomas shows them the way out, they'll be sent to a premeditated room. There, the last Phase of their trials will be concluded, and yours will begin."
"But what will we have to do?" George asked.
"Follow me, please." Doctor Paige left the screen room and guided them to an infirmary a couple of rooms away. There, a passed-out boy rested on one of the beds. "He's part of the Variables; The Bait Betrayer. Group A must be under such circumstances of stress that your good action will be deprived of any doubt."
"What will the good action be?" Rowan wondered.
"Saving a life, Rowan. Saving our most important Subject's life, which William will perform." Chancellor Paige gave William and Rowan a reassuring pat on their shoulders and used it to make them and the rest continue walking to their next visit.
The hours until the mission started went by slowly. William was nervous about the 'saving a life' part of the plan he had to fulfil. What if he wasn't quick enough? Or he missed? He doubted himself so much that he was sure he would freeze the moment he saw the boys.
Of course, that wasn't all there was. He wondered about his memories. They seemed to come to him at random. In one, he could be ten, and in the next, twelve. It was usually with the same people, Newt, Teresa, or Thomas. Not once had he had a memory with his group. Some names were mentioned, like Sonya, Minho, or Chuck, but he never got to see the faces behind the names.
Around the second or third hour, the four waited with full hand-sized bags strapped to their waist. Some doctors had given them the tracking devices that Janson had talked about before. They weren't voluptuous and could be easily hidden under their arms' bandages.
They watched, hidden in the corner of a hallway, how a row of doctors stared at the poor, terrified boys, who had just made it from the Trials. There were around fifteen boys, maybe more. And what almost made William sigh out loud was Newt, Thomas, and Teresa being between them.
A muffled yell coming from the inside of the room made the group's curiosity spike and peek a little further. There was the guy from the failed pep talk, yelling at the glass, while Thomas, right away, covered his ears.
"Ready, Group S?" Chancellor Paige asked, appearing out of nowhere with the boy they had seen a couple of hours ago.
The boy couldn't look worse. Despite his hood covering his face, William could tell he was crying. They understood. Betraying his friends, those he had lived for the past two years, couldn't be easy. Much less when he would be physically forced to do so.
The four of them nodded and followed behind the woman while standing close enough to the boy. William was ready to feign and act his struggle to keep the orders from affecting him. However, there was no need to feign anything, as his body moved by itself.
He was being controlled.
Why? I was supposed to save Thomas, wasn't I? Why are they making me stay still? He wondered, too baffled to let anxiety get the best of him yet.
His eyes managed to look around him. Not surprisingly, the rest were the same. They all had their mouths slightly agape, as if terrified. And they trembled, probably due to the constant struggle against their own bodies.
"Welcome back," Doctor Paige said, "Over two years, and so few dead. Amazing."
"Excuse me?" Newt asked, rightfully puzzled.
"Everything has gone according to plan, Mr Newton." Paige kept talking, but William didn't listen to a second of it.
"What's he doing here!" shouted the boy from the earlier failed attempt at a pep talk.
"You're safe now," Paige assured. "Please, be at ease."
Well, they'd be safe if I could bloody move to save Thomas! William thought, his eyes landing on Teresa as he continued to fight off the mind control.
'Teresa!'
'Wi—William?' Teresa answered, locking eyes with him. 'What's wrong? What's going on?'
'Not much time to explain. Help Thomas. He'll bloody die if I can't get my body to move.' He tried to move, but it didn't work.
'What!' Her eyes then travelled to Thomas, who had the little boy too close to him. 'No, it can't be.'
'Teresa, please, trust me. Thomas is in danger. Whatever they told you, they lied.'
There was nothing William liked about the situation. He tried time and time again — moving a finger, a hand, turning his head slightly — until, bit by bit, he regained control over his body. He only hoped he would be quick enough to save Thomas.
"Gally," Newt said. "What's going on?"
William forced himself to stay still and not turn his head to look at Gally. It didn't matter how much he hated being controlled, he couldn't give away the fact that he could break out of the mind control easily, or quickly. The boy did not answer Newt's question, so he doubted Gally was in any better position than he was.
"They . . . can control me . . . us . . . we don't —" Gally muttered, seemingly fighting the mind control. "I . . . we . . . have . . . to . . ."
William couldn't take it anymore. He didn't want Thomas to die because he couldn't move. He didn't want anyone dying because of him. "Please . . . step . . . move."
"Just . . . duck." Rowan's tone resembled almost pleading.
George couldn't form a word, and Leen didn't add anything either. William hoped they were alright. Although he doubted it. Their bodies suddenly reacted to a silent order, taking the knives out of their pockets with shaky hands. They tried to lower it, or raise it. In any case, aim at a place where it wouldn't kill someone. However, nothing of that kind happened.
"Soldier S5, throw." The order made its way to his mind before he could think.
William did throw the knife. Only not to the person anyone was expecting.
His knife found its way to the Chancellor's chest.
"William!" Rowan shouted, the grip on her knife faltering to the point it could fall to the floor at any minute.
He turned around to face the boy, Gally. And understood immediately why she was shouting. Gally, unlike the four of them, still had a tight grasp on the weapon. He turned rapidly to get the knife out of the boy's hands, but he was too late.
There was no doubt in his actions. William ran towards Thomas, or rather, the little boy that had jumped to protect him. It all passed in a second; sprinting towards the two boys, yanking the bag from its hiding, and placing it on the projectile's trajectory.
Luckily, the knife got caught in the bag.
No one had died.