Dynasty - Thomas (The Maze Runner)

Chapter 11 - Some Guys Have All The Luck

The helicopter ride feels like it's never going to end. We took off in the late afternoon, it's now pitch black outside. I've sat for the whole ride with Thomas' head resting on my lap as he sleeps, and I'm starting to get cramp. As the helicopter begins to land, he starts twitching and shaking. There's a few fearful, whispered 'no's mixed in there too. He's having a nightmare. As the helicopter touches down on the ground, we are hurried out, well everyone else is, Minho is yelling Thomas' name to rouse him, so I can stand and move too. I don't know what's happening outside, but it's clearly something bad as I can hear lots of gunfire. Thomas' eyes snap open, and he quickly lifts his head off my lap to jump up. I do the same, hopping out of the helicopter and towards the doors I am being ushered over to. I stop running when I see Thomas stand dead still and run back. I'm being grabbed in an attempt to pull me to safety, but I refuse to move without knowing whether Thomas is going to be okay or not. I see him reach into the copter to grab something before running back in my direction. It's Chuck's bloodied ornament. 

"Go!" He shouts to me, so I keep running towards the doors, both Thomas and I getting through just in time before they close. They lock behind us. We look around and this place is like nothing we've ever seen before (or at least we don't remember seeing anything like it). We try to take in our surroundings before we are escorted to a room with decent food - so y'know anything but Fry's cooking. It seems to be a storage room. Once we're all in the room, the door is shut behind us.

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The next time the door is opened, we are greeted by a thin man with greying hairs and a rat-like face. He looks middle-aged, in the mid-late forties. 

"You kids doing alright?" He asks, "Sorry about all the fuss, we had ourselves a bit of a swarm," We all slowly walk towards him, some more wearily than others.

"Who are you?" Thomas questions.

"I'm the reason you're all still alive," I raise my eyebrows at this, I didn't see them helping us out the maze when they had shucking helicopters.

"I intend to keep you that way, now come with me, we'll get you kids squared away," We follow after him when he retreats out the door. He walks us through the building, talking to us, introducing himself and then sending us off to the showers. After cleaning ourselves off we redress and are led through to another room where we are examined and checked over. I was prodded and poked, injected with needles filled with shuck knows what and blood was taken from my arm. Afterwards, Minho and I took our places on the treadmills, running for a while to keep ourselves athletically inclined. Another nurse saunters into the room heading towards Teresa and closing the curtain around them both, something that hadn't been done for the rest of us. It might just be a case of trust issues, but I'm sceptical of this place and the people who have taken us in. I see a soldier approach Thomas, calling out his name as he stands in front of him. Thomas stares up at the man towering over him before following after him when he leaves the room. I move to step off the treadmill and after him, but the doctor next to me just coughs evocatively, prompting me to keep running.

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The next time I see Thomas is in this big dining hall area we've been led to. Here we are surrounded by loads of other kids, all ranging between the ages of about 11 and 17, possibly some that little bit older. These other kids, and there's about a hundred, maybe even a hundred and fifty all sat in this room eating, they've all been subject to the Maze Trials too. We weren't the only ones to have to live through the horrors of the maze. In a way, it's a relief, but in another, it's kind of sick how WICKED have put so many kids through this amount of suffering. Minho spots Thomas first and walks over to him, leading him over to us as he gives him a quick rundown of everything we know so far. Thomas sits between Newt and me. I turn my head to acknowledge his presence, smiling slightly as he leans to give me a quick peck on the lips. I then focus my attention back on this kid, David, who is recounting how he came to be here.

"And there was this big, loud explosion, and these guys came outta nowhere, starting shooting up the place,"

"It was intense," the guy next to him adds.

"They pulled us out of the maze and brought us here,"

"What about the rest? The other people left behind in the maze. What happened to them?" Newt queries.

"I don't know. I guess WICKED still has them..." Thomas looks at Newt, raising his eyebrows slightly, almost unnoticeably.

"How long have you guys been here?" I ask before Newt can even open his mouth.

"Not long, just a day or two. That kid over there has been here the longest," he says looking over to a 15/16-year-old boy sat on his own on another table with his hood over his head, "almost a week,"

"His maze was nothing but girls," Adds in the boy sat on the other side of him.

"Really?" Minho asks inquisitively.

"Some guys have all the luck," He says, looking over at me, staring me up and down. I glare at him and feel an arm wrap around my waist. It's Thomas pulling me closer, though he should know there's nothing for him to worry about. Now that I think about it, we aren't exactly dating, are we? It's not exclusive. We didn't talk about it, but I suppose we didn't really have time to either. It's a conversation we will have to have later, but how do you even come about that sort of discussion?  Before anything else could be said, Janson walked into the room.

"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. You all know how this works if you hear your name called then please rise in an orderly fashion and join my colleagues behind me, where they will escort you to the eastern wing. Your new lives are about to begin," Everyone around us starts to clap. He proceeds to read out 8 names in a succession of one another and each time someone rises from their seat to stand behind him. He closes his folder and there's a lot of groans and sighs from those surrounding us. I'm glad though as if I had been picked I'd have been separated from my friends, and whatever Thomas is. As everyone resumes with their eating, Minho asks the question we all want to know.

"Where are they going?"

"Far from here," David replies, turning back round to us, noticing Thomas' arm still wrapped around my waist almost possessively, "Lucky bastards,"

"Some kind of farm, a safe place. They can only take a couple of people at a time,"

"Anyway, is there something going on between you two?" David asks (something I'd like to know the answer to as well), but as the words leave his lips, Thomas' arm moves away and his head turns to a window, where he can see Teresa passing through the corridor on the other side of it. Thomas jumps from his seat following the window across the room until he reaches the guards and presumably starts to question where Teresa is being taken.