228.04.03 | 7:00 a.m.
Thomas reached over, hit snooze on his alarm clock, and dropped his arm over the side of his bed. He hated the wake-up on days after a maintenance room rendezvous, possibly hated that alarm more than a houseful of Cranks. Hungry Cranks.
But he did relish those ten minutes that followed hitting snooze, before the alarm blared again. It was like a little bonus to himself every morning.
He curled back into a ball, content, if just for a moment.
He hadn’t seen Minho for over a year, even though he’d survived the punishment with the Griever. Well, at least physically. Alby said that mentally, emotionally…Minho was different. He wasn’t as talkative, or reckless, and he certainly never mentioned the word escape again. The passing of time can certainly heal a lot of wounds, but the way Alby described their mutual friend, Minho would need about twenty more years.
The other members of their “maintenance room” clan met once a week. Everyone but Minho. He hadn’t shown up once since the fateful day, and Newt said their friend wouldn’t even consider it. He was a shell of the person they’d all gotten to know. It made Thomas incredibly sad. He’d really liked Minho, and everything about their situation seemed so unfair. Who could blame him for reacting this way after the horror show WICKED called his punishment?
Thomas believed in the cure—at least, he told himself he did. But WICKED treating them like lab rats—sometimes that turned his sadness into anger. Often he’d have to kneel by his bed and pound on the mattress with both fists until he collapsed from exhaustion. He wanted it all to be over, a cure in hand, and he did his best to stay positive in that regard. Dr. Paige always said the data was plentiful and rolling in.
Maybe, just maybe, the end was in sight, no matter how distant the horizon.
He and Teresa were almost done with the maze, just slightly behind the pace of Group B, from what they’d been told. But that was just it. Thomas had a harder and harder time believing them. WICKED continued to isolate him and Teresa, so he relied on the latest gossip from Alby, Newt, and his most plentiful source, Chuck. That kid had a brain like a sponge, soaking in every little comment he ever heard or overheard. They might tease him without mercy, but when Chuck spoke, people listened.
Thomas’s daily ten minutes of morning bliss ended in a cacophony of klaxon sounds when his alarm went off again. He hated it more than solar flares.
Dr. Paige showed up with breakfast, right on time. How long had he known this woman? Longer than his own mom, for sure. By years. And today he could read something different in her manner, a difference in her smile. A pain behind the bright intelligence her eyes always showed.
He wanted to ask her what was wrong, but their relationship had never quite recovered after what WICKED had done to Minho. Still, of all the people who worked there, in whatever capacity, Dr. Paige was the one he liked most, and he had to fight to keep any kind of wall between them. Though it was a very thin wall, and the mortar holding it together had begun to crumble.
“How are we today?” she asked him once she’d set the breakfast on his desk. “Work day today, right?”
Thomas nodded, then sat down to eat. Normally they talked a little, about how tests were going, his classes, progress on the mazes, etc. But before Thomas could take one bite of his eggs, Dr. Paige was headed for the door. She’d just opened it and was about to step into the hallway when Thomas stopped her.
“Hey,” he said. “Can you come back in for a second?”
She paused, let out a heavy sigh. But then she closed the door and came back to the desk, took the other chair. She looked at him with sad eyes.
Thomas couldn’t help himself—curiosity always won.
“I wasn’t going to ask,” he said, “but…is there something wrong?” For a long moment he was scared. What if one of his friends had died? Not Teresa, though. He would definitely have felt her absence, or her last moments. He would have had some clue.
“Thomas…,” Dr. Paige began. She looked around the room as if she might literally find words posted on the walls. “We’re getting very close to sending subjects into the mazes.” She let out a little laugh and met his eyes again. “Well, you would know that better than anyone. How is your work going in there?”
She meant his and Teresa’s efforts in the maze cavern.
“It’s going fine. Pretty fun. I don’t know.”
“You sound less than enthused.”
“It’s just been hard for me to get over some things. There are secrets—things you’ve been keeping from us. Some of it just doesn’t seem right. And people could be nicer. Like Randall. Like Ramirez. Dr. Leavitt.” It felt good to get some of this off his chest.
She crossed her legs and gave him a look of sincere concern.
“I don’t know if you’ll believe this, Thomas, but I’ve struggled with these very things myself. I could offer you excuses—but I’m guessing that’s not what you want to hear.”
Thomas shook his head. “Even the fact that you call us subjects. I mean, we’re human, not a bunch of mice.” His voice had gotten a little firmer, but Paige kept her cool, nodding as if she understood completely.
“I think it boils down to two things,” she said. “First, even though everything we’re doing at the moment is leading to the Maze Trials, that doesn’t mean that the Psychs haven’t been looking for every opportunity to seek out killzone patterns. Every second of every day matters, as I’m sure you understand. Just in the time we’ve spoken this morning, how many hundreds or thousands of people have caught the Flare out there in the world? How many have died?”
“So your solution is…take it out on kids?” Thomas asked, even though he knew it was a stupid thing to say. These people had saved them from almost certain death.
Anger flashed across Dr. Paige’s face. “This is a harsh, brutal virus that needs to be dealt with by…using harsh and brutal will, Thomas. If you would just…stop thinking about how hard things are for you. You have no idea…” She faltered and a look of regret shadowed her face. “I’m sorry. I’m…sorry. The truth is just too damn hard to talk about.”
She stood up, her eyes moist with tears. She appeared to be on the verge of saying something else, but then she turned her back to him and left the room, closing the door gently behind her.
