Admit Defeat (TMR fic 2)

Chapter 2

At first I think the screaming is just another memory, just another horrible event I'll have to relive. Then someone touches my face and I jolt awake.

Newt sighs with relief from above me, the sound barely audible above the yelling and screaming in the background. "You're okay."

"What happened?" I ask, my voice hoarse. The room is chaos around us. Gladers are shouting and arguing while a cacophony of screams backs their voices.

"We don't know," he says, his jaw clenched. "About half of us woke up an hour or so ago. You'll... have to see it. I can't describe it. But the rest of you were completely out. We couldn't wake you up for anything. I was worried you'd all gone like that bloody girl had when she first showed up."

I remember the figure in the gas mask from the night before, and I shudder. Someone did something to us. I'm getting pretty tired of being treated like an animal.

Newt climbs down the ladder of the bunk bed, and I follow him.

"Welcome," Newt says in a fake dramatic voice, "to paradise."

He takes my hand with the same overdramatic flair, and leads me to the windows of the room.

Oh.

Oh.

I understand why he said he couldn't describe it. People are screaming through the open windows, clawing at bars set firmly into the frames. Bars designed to keep them out, or keep us in? They're deranged, spit flying from their mouths as they yell and howl.

Kill me. Kill me. Better dead than a Crank. Save me from the Scorch. Kill me.

Their voices tumble together into an insane river of sound, and I press my hands to my ears. I'm trembling slightly. Whoever they are... whatever is wrong with them... I stare at the wounds that coat their bodies, at the way they bleed and cry and ignore how their skin tears from beating at the bars of our windows.

That is what was in my dream. My memory.

Better dead than a Crank... is that what they are? Cranks? I don't know what the word means, but I know I don't want to find out.

The memory I had... I realize something horrifying so instantaneously it's like cold water was dumped down my back.

WICKED made Newt kill one of them because he loved his sister. I need to process that he has a sister, but something else is more pressing to me right now.

They will always use love as a weapon. Always.

We may have escaped the place called WICKED, but... I remember the pure pain that poured through my system when I attacked the scientist. They can control us. I can't escape their claws. Not truly.

And the fastest way to submit to them... the one guarantee to be manipulated... is to show emotion.

They will use our feelings as ammunition to destroy us.

I sit on the top bunk, knees pulled in against my chest so I have something to hold onto. The door to our room is locked, and the screaming is endless.

I hate it so much. Everything in my mind is screaming that this is wrong, that I need to run, that I need to get out of here.

But we're stuck.

I hate being trapped. Newt watches me anxiously, but when he offers to sit with me I shake my head sharply. I don't want to be weak, and if he is with me I won't be able to keep my walls up.

He can make me crumble like no one else, and I'm scared of what will happen if I let go. I can't show fear. I can't let anyone see my weakness.

My only comfort is that we seem to be safe for the moment. The light flooding in through the windows also helps some. At least it's not dark.

I hold onto myself tightly.

I can't think through the screams.

We're directionless, panicking, stuck. We need Thomas. Unfortunately he's one of the Gladers still asleep.

I know he's probably still under the effects of the drugs, but I snap. I can't sit still in this room for one minute longer. I need to do something, and right now that means waking Thomas up.