The Desolation (The Maze Runner)

10. Call

She whispered in the silence, staring at the notification.

"WICKED Headquarters."

"Let the call in," she commanded the computer and tried to straighten her hair.

They shouldn't know she already had sex with their test subject.

Although they so knew it already, they were all adults.

"Miss Lale. Miss Lale, are you there?" she heard the voice of Janson.

She hated this man so much; he worked with her mother and betrayed her.

"Miss Lale," Janson repeated.

"Make visual and vocal contact, keep our channels clean," she muttered to the computer.

A second later, Janson's face appeared on the screen. He looked a lot worse than three years ago.

"Miss Lale, nice to see you again. For a fraction of a second, we had the fear that you were gone forever," he tried to smile.

"I don't know what universe you live in, but three years isn't a fraction of a second," she retorted.

"Oh, Miss Lale, have you told your lovely boyfriend about your handsome ex who unfortunately ended up as a Crank?" asked Janson.

It was like every time he opened his mouth, a cloud of poison came out of it and formed into words.

"I think you didn't call to talk about insignificant pasts," she raised her eyebrows.

"I just want to know if my trial subject is okay," he looked at her.

"Newt!" she felt the anger.

"Just wanted to know if my Newt is okay," he smiled. "You saw his tattoo, it's still our Newt, not yours."

"He's no one's Newt, he belongs to himself alone. And if you have nothing to say, I'm going to go," she said coldly.

"Oh, I just want to ask if we could have him earlier, maybe?" Janson smiled.

"No, we made a deal." Salsa felt that her fists were hurting, she was clenching them so hard.

"Sure, I just had a little hope... Yes, there was this other thing," he looked at some papers in front of him.

"You finally discovered that you're an idiot who will never come up with a cure?" Salsa smiled.

Janson coughed.

"We're nearly ready for the final trial, but it will be more dangerous than everything that we've been through. So I would like you to participate in it," he said.

"Really? As a puppy dog or a flying rabbit?" she asked.

"Miss Lale, this is serious, we're running out of time. We finally found someone who can change everything. We found our Final Candidate." Janson took a breath.

Did he really believe what he said?

"Wow, it took you years to discover what I discovered after spending half an hour out on the battlefield with the guy," she shook her head. "But he's a good person, Janson, don't break him or he'll be useless to you."

"So you volunteer to scan your brain activity to see how a cold blooded murderer's brain looks like?" he asked.

"I'm a soldier, a warrior, call it whatever you want, but I'm not a murderer. It's a war and I'm fighting on the right side."

They both shot each other icy looks.

"I need Thomas alive. You can protect him during the trial," said Janson. "You're the best at it. We'll look past that one little accident when you failed to protect-"