The Scorch Trials (The Maze Runner Book 2) (61)
CHAPTER
61
Thomas
knew they couldn’t waste any more time. No questions, no fear, no bickering.
Only action.
“Come
on!” he yelled, pulling Brenda’s arm as he stepped out of the pod. He slipped
and toppled over, landing with a wet smush in the mud. He pushed himself
up, spitting the slimy stuff out of his mouth and rubbing it from his eyes, and
scrambled back to his feet. The rain poured down, thunder cracked from all directions,
lightning bolts lit the air in ominous flashes.
Jorge
and Teresa had made it out, Brenda helping them. Thomas looked over at the
Berg—maybe fifty feet away—its cargo door now fully open, a gaping maw of an
entrance to warm light inside. Shadowy forms stood there, holding guns,
waiting. They obviously didn’t intend to come out and assist anybody onto the
safe haven. The real safe haven.
“Run!”
he screamed, already on the move. He held his knife in front of him, gripped
tightly, in case any of those creatures were still alive and looking for a
fight.
Teresa
and the others kept pace next to him.
The
rain-softened ground made it hard to get good traction; Thomas slipped twice,
fell down once. Teresa grabbed his shirt and yanked until he was up and running
again. Others were around them, making the same dash for the safety of the
ship. The darkness of the storm and the veil of rain and brilliant flashes of
lightning made it hard to see who was who. No time to worry about it.
From
the right side, lumbering around the back end of the plane, a dozen of the bulb
creatures appeared; they headed for a spot cutting off Thomas and his friends
from the open cargo door. Their blades were slick with rain, some stained
crimson. At least half of their creepy glowing bulbs had been busted, and their
jerky movements showed it. But they looked as dangerous as ever. And still, the
people in the Berg did nothing, only watched.
“Go
right through ’em!” Thomas yelled. Minho appeared, along with Newt and a few
other Gladers, joining the charge. Harriet and a few of the Group B girls, too.
Everyone seemed to understand the plan, as slight as it was: fight off these
last few monsters and get out of there.
Maybe
for the first time since entering the Glade weeks earlier, Thomas felt no fear.
He didn’t know if he’d ever feel it again. He didn’t know why, but something had
changed. Lightning exploded around him, someone screamed, the rain intensified.
Wind tore through the air, pelting him with small rocks and drops of water that
hurt equally. The creatures swiped their blades through the air, screaming
their disturbing roar as they waited for battle. Thomas ran on, knife held
above his head.
No
fear.
Three
feet from the center creature he jumped into the air, kicking forward, both
legs held tightly together. He slammed his feet into one of the orange bulbs
protruding from the middle of the monster’s chest. It burst and sizzled; the
creature wailed something hideous and fell backward, slamming to the ground.
Thomas
landed in the mud and rolled to the side. Immediately jumped up and danced
around the creature, slashing and poking, bursting the glowing growths.
Pop,
pop, pop.
Dodging
and jumping away from the futile slashes of the creature’s blades. Retaliating,
stabbing. Pop, pop, pop. Only three bulbs were left; it could barely
move. Thomas straddled the thing in a burst of confidence and quickly
threw down the final vicious thrusts to end it.
The
last bulb burst and fizzled out. Dead.
Thomas
got up, spun around to see if someone else needed help. Teresa had finished off
hers. Minho and Jorge as well. Newt was there, favoring his bad leg, Brenda
helping him stab out the remaining bulbs on his foe.
A
few seconds later it ended. No creature moved. No orange lights shone. It was
over.
Thomas,
breathing heavily, looked up at the entrance to the ship, only twenty feet
away. Even as he did, its thrusters ignited and the ship started to lift off
the ground.
“It’s
leaving!” Thomas screamed as loudly as he could, pointing frantically at their
only means of escape. “Hurry!”
The
word had barely escaped his mouth when Teresa grabbed him by the arm, pulling
as she ran for the ship. Thomas stumbled, then righted himself, pounding his
feet in the mud. He heard the crack of thunder behind them, saw a flash of
lightning fill the sky. Another scream. Others beside him, around him, in front
of him now, all running. Newt with his limp, Minho next to him, eyeing him to
make sure he didn’t fall.
The
Berg had reached a point three feet off the ground, slowly rising and turning
at the same time, ready at any second to shift those thrusters and zip away. A
couple of Gladers and three girls reached it first, dove onto the platform of
the open cargo door. Still it rose. Others reached it, climbed on, scrambled inside.
Then
Thomas made it with Teresa. The open hatch was chest-high now. He jumped and
pushed his hands down on the flat metal, arms stiff, stomach pressed against
the thick edge. Swung his right leg up, got leverage, rolled his body fully
onto the door. The ship, still rising. Others climbing on, reaching to pull
others up. Teresa, halfway on, trying to find a handhold.
Thomas
reached out and grabbed her hand, pulled her in. She collapsed on top of him,
shared a brief look of victory. Then she was off, and both of them approached
the edge of the door to see if anyone needed help.
The
Berg was now six feet above the ground, starting to tilt. Three people still
hung from the edge. Harriet and Newt were pulling a girl in. Minho was helping
Aris. But Brenda held on only with her hands, her body dangling as she kicked
her feet and tried to pull herself up.
Thomas
dropped to his stomach and scooted closer, reached out and grabbed her right
arm. Teresa got the other one. The metal of the cargo door was wet and slick;
when Thomas pulled on Brenda he started sliding out, but then stopped abruptly.
A quick look behind him revealed that Jorge had planted his butt and feet,
holding tightly to both Thomas and Teresa.
Thomas
looked back at Brenda, started pulling again. With Teresa’s help, she finally
came over the edge enough for her stomach to gain purchase; it was easy from
there. As she crawled on and farther in, Thomas took another look outside at
the ground, slowly moving away. Nothing but those horrific creatures, lifeless
and wet, full of saggy pockets of flesh that had once been full and brightly
lit. A few dead human bodies, but not many, and no one Thomas was close to.
He
scooted backward, away from the edge, feeling an immense amount of relief.
They’d made it, most of them. They’d made it through Cranks and lightning and
hideous monsters. They’d made it. He bumped into Teresa, turned toward her,
pulled her in and hugged her tightly, forgetting what had happened for a second.
They’d made it.
“Who
are these two people?”
Thomas
jerked away from Teresa to see who’d shouted—it was a man with short red hair,
holding a black pistol pointed at Brenda and Jorge, who sat next to each other,
shivering and wet and bruised.
“Somebody
answer me!” the man yelled again.
Thomas
spoke up before he could think about it. “They helped us get through the
city—we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for them.”
The
man snapped his head toward Thomas. “You … picked them up along the
way?”
Thomas
nodded, not liking where this was going. “We made a deal with them. Promised
they’d get the cure, too. We still have fewer people than we started with.”
“Doesn’t
matter,” the man said. “We didn’t say you could bring citizens!”
The
Berg continued to climb higher in the sky, but the gaping door didn’t close.
Wind whipped through the wide hole; any one of them could go tumbling to their
death if they hit turbulence.
Thomas
got to his feet anyway, determined to defend the pact he’d made. “Well, you
told us to come here, and we did what we had to do!”
Their
gun-toting host paused, seemed to consider this line of reasoning. “Sometimes I
forget how little you people understand what’s going on. Fine, you can keep one
of ’em. The other goes.”
Thomas
tried not to show the jolt this gave him. “What do you mean … the other goes?”
The
man clicked something on the gun, then held its end closer to Brenda’s head. “We
don’t have time for this! You have five seconds to choose the one who stays.
Don’t choose and they both die. One.”
“Wait!”
Thomas looked at Brenda, at Jorge. They both stared at the floor, said nothing.
Their faces palewith fear.
“Two.”
Thomas
suppressed the rising panic, closed his eyes. There was nothing new here. No,
he understood things now. Knew what he had to do.
“Three.”
No
more fear. No more shock. No more questioning. Take what comes. Play along.
Pass the tests. Pass the Trials.
“Four!”
The man’s face reddened. “Choose right now or they both die!”
Thomas
opened his eyes and stepped forward. Then he pointed at Brenda and said the two
most foul words to ever pass through his lips.
“Kill
her.”
Because
of the odd pronouncement that only one could stay, Thomas thought he
understood, thought he knew what would happen. That it was yet another Variable
and they’d take whomever he didn’t choose. But he was wrong.
The
man jammed his gun into the waistband of his pants, then reached down and
grabbed Brenda’s shirt with two hands, yanking the girl to her feet. Without a
word, he moved toward open air, taking her with him.
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