Ticking Time Bomb [THE SCORCH TRIALS]

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Love is a strange emotion. It is ever evolving. Lust is transient. With time, one realizes that love and togetherness are two different things. Very few people are lucky enough to experience the two emotions simultaneously.

THE BRISK AIR of the day danced across Ingrid's cheek as her heartbeat tried to tame itself down. She still couldn't fathom the events that had occurred to her, and her body was surely moving, but her brain and senses were not caught up to speed. She felt like a crank; lifeless, moving along with no sense of direction except to follow whatever was in her line of sight. "We can get down this way! Come on!" Brenda shouted off to what felt like a far away abyss to Ingrid, and thus Thomas clasped a firm hand around her arm to guide her down the windowsills to let themselves onto the ground below. Thankfully, where Ingrid had broken the window, led to an exit that they properly used. She knew her legs were moving, she could feel them taking careful and steady steps, with whispers of encouragement from Thomas flooding her ear canal.

She felt her legs hit the concrete floor beneath her, and like that, she had returned herself back down to the world. A jolt of energy ran through her as she snapped out of the daze she had been stuck in, remembering she has been through worse. It has been worse, she repeated the mantra in her head. They quietly began making their way down the street, spreading apart as if they were scared to enter each other's space. Noise bustled from up ahead, and Thomas echoed the thoughts of the three, saying "Hey, you guys hear that?"

However, before the Clearwater girl had a chance to agree, she heard Brenda grunt, and the sound of a backpack hitting the floor echoed throughout the street. Both Thomas and Ingrid turned around in confusion, facing a disheveled Brenda as she ruffled through her knapsack. "You alright?" Ingrid asked tentatively, as she warily eyed the first aid supplies Brenda was taking out of her knapsack feverishly. She did not respond, instead, the two moved closer to her as she rolled up her blouse sleeve to reveal a cut. A cut that Ingrid knew far too well. A cut that Ingrid had hoped she wouldn't see ever again.

The same cut that had begun to murder her mother from the inside out all those years ago.

"Shit," Brenda inhaled deeply, biting her lip in pain as she grabbed a roll of tape from her bag. She ignored the fearful gaze of Thomas and Ingrid, who just simply didn't even have words to express. It felt as though the wind had been knocked out of Ingrid, and found it hard to even stand on her two feet. However, that was how it seemed to be most of these days for the aforementioned girl.

"Brenda, that doesn't look too good-"

Ingrid could barely finish her sentence before Brenda retorted with, "Yeah, yeah, I know. Crank must've gotten me when it pushed me aside to try and get to you." Ingrid couldn't help but almost feel immediately guilty, knowing it should have been her with that cut, and that imminent fear. It was her own fault for even standing there. Ingrid felt so overcome with emotion, tears brimming her eyes, able to count the days Brenda had left in her mind. It terrified her more than she let on, and the privileged shield of Jansen and his protetion that she hid behind no longer served her.

"Let's just go find Marcus," Brenda wiped one lone tear that had found its way down her face, and she pushed past the two grief stricken teenagers, walking towards to end of the dark street, where noise and lights danced across the dawn of the sky. Thomas and Ingrid shared a quick glance before following after her, knowing there was nothing left but to await her destruction. It felt horrific, to be able to welcome death with open arms. But, it was the new normal. It was their new normal, whether they claimed it or not. Cranks were not picky people, they did not pick and choose who they decided to infect. It was a simple equation. They saw, they conquered. Although Ingrid did not know Brenda well whatsoever, she felt as if she should already start going through the five stages of grief for her.