The Death Cure (The Maze Runner Book 3) (9)
CHAPTER
9
It
took over an hour of staring into the dark, but Thomas eventually fell asleep.
And when he did, his dreams were a slew of scattered images and memories.
A
woman, sitting at a table, smiling as she stares across the wood surface,
directly into his eyes. As he watches her she picks up a cup of steaming liquid
and takes a tentative sip. Another smile. Then she says, “Eat your cereal, now.
That’s a good boy.” It’s his mom, with her kind face, her love for him evident
in every crease of her skin as she grins. She doesn’t stop watching over him until
he eats the last bite, and she takes his bowl over to the sink after tousling
his hair.
Then
he’s on the carpeted floor of a small room, playing with silvery blocks that
seem to fuse together as he builds a huge castle. His mom is sitting on a chair
in the corner, crying. Thomas knows instantly why. His dad has been diagnosed
with the Flare, is already showing signs of it. This leaves no doubt that his
mom also has the disease, or will soon. The dreaming Thomas knows that it won’t
be long before doctors realize his younger self has the virus but is immune to
its effects. By then they’d developed the test that recognizes it.
Next
he’s riding his bike on a hot day. Heat’s rising from the pavement, just weeds
on both sides of the street, where there used to be grass. He has a smile on
his sweaty face. His mom watches nearby, and hecan see that she’s savoring
every moment. They head to a nearby pond. The water is stagnant and
foulsmelling. She gathers rocks for him to toss into the murky depths. At first
he throws them as far as possible; then he tries to skip them the way his dad
showed him last summer. He still can’t do it. Tired, their strength sapped from
the stifling weather, he and his mother finally head home.
Then
things in the dream—the memories—turn darker.
He’s
back inside and a man in a dark suit is sitting on a couch. Papers in his hand,
a grave look on his face. Thomas standing next to his mom, holding her hand.
WICKED has been formed, a joint venture of the world’s governments—those that
survived the sun flares, an event that took place long before Thomas was born.
WICKED’s purpose is to study what is now known as the killzone, where the Flare
does its damage. The brain.
The
man is saying that Thomas is immune. Others are immune. Less than one percent
of the population, most of them under the age of twenty. And the world is
dangerous for them. They’re hated for their immunity to the terrible virus, are
mockingly called Munies. People do terrible things to them. WICKED says they
can protect Thomas, and Thomas can help them work to find a cure. They say he’s
smart—one of the smartest who have been tested. His mom has no choice but to
let him go. She certainly doesn’t want her boy to watch as she slowly goes
insane.
Later
she tells Thomas that she loves him and is so glad that he’ll never go through
what they witnessed happen to his dad. The madness took away every ounce of
what made him who he was—what made him human.
And
after that the dream faded, and Thomas fell into a deep void of sleep.
*
* *
A
loud knocking woke him early the next morning. He’d barely gotten up on his
elbows when the door opened and the same five guards from the day before came
in with Launchers raised. Janson stepped into the room right after them.
“Rise
and shine, boys,” the Rat Man said. “We’ve decided to give you your memories
back after all. Like it or not.”
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