Subject A250: The Flame (COMPLETED)

Twenty-Five: Hydration and Motivation

A/N: Thank you so much for 2K reads!

There was nothing to see in the distance but the mountain range she was so desperate to reach. That, and miles and miles of barren desert terrain. No tourist attractions, no shops, no park to play on the swings — it was going to be a very long walk.

She didn't dare look behind her. She knew that if she did, she wouldn't be able to resist the temptation of heading back there. She'd try to hold a funeral or memorial service. She'd try to bury Rose.

She'd also break down again, and Trace just didn't have the time to do that; she needed to get to the mountain range. She needed to be strong. She needed to burn on like the flame she was.

So Trace kept walking.

"I'll be coming 'round the mountain when I come

Well, actually, that's what you'll do when you come

You'll be coming 'round the mountain

And I'll meet you at that mountain

We'll be meeting at the mountain when we come."

Trace took a deep breath, preparing for the oh-so-important second verse. She continued:

"I'll be riding six white horses when I come

Yes, that's right I'll have six horses when I come

They'll be magical white horses

Who knows where I sourced this?

I'll be riding six white horses just for fun."

But she wasn't finished there; Trace had plenty of time left to sing and nobody there to stop her. She was going to finish this song.

"And you'll all come out to meet me when I come

And I'll do a sudden flip, then kick and run

And you'll all think I'm impressive

'Cause my style is quite addictive

Soon we'll all be flipping, kicking while we run."

And I hope you bring bananas when you come

Because I do like bananas in the sun

And we've got a lot of sun here

Thanks to our old friend, the sun flare

So I hope you'll bring bananas when you come

Now it was time for the last verse. She had to make it impressive. Astounding. This song had to sell out stadiums, wow fans worldwide, and most importantly...

It had to rhyme.

"We'll be fighting brand new monsters when we come

'Cause the trial goes forever- still not done

And we'll kill them like the Grievers

Only, this time, there's no levers

So we'll have to smash their lights out when they come."

Nobody applauded, and Trace was a little offended. She'd worked hard on that song and no nearby rock or grain of sand could even lift their hands to acknowledge her. Unforgivably rude.

She stopped and reached into her backpack, pulling out a drink bottle. She really wanted to just guzzle down all that was left in there, but she still had a day or two before she reached the mountains, and future Trace would probably appreciate hydration.

Although, so would present Trace....

No. She had to save it. She had to be smart about this. There was nobody here to tell her to ration her supplies or stay vigilant. She had to do that for herself.

"I wonder if I can do a cartwheel."

Apparently now was also the time to start talking to herself. As long as there wasn't anyone to tell her what to do, there wasn't anyone to hear her crazy ramblings either.

After receiving a mouthful of dirt and a graze along one of her arms, Trace discovered that, no, she could not, in fact, do a cartwheel.

"It's alright," she reassured herself. "I have talents in other areas. Like shutting down Grievers or fighting Grievlets."

She thought to herself for a second.

"Also annoying people. I'm really good at that. If annoying people was an Olympic sport, I'd have more medals than I could carry. Not that I could carry very many, because physical strength is not one of my aforementioned talents."

It was still a long way to the mountains, but Trace figured she was relatively in the clear now. As clear as she could be in the Scorch. She knew something terrible could still happen, but even after reading the series, she struggled to come up with anything much worse than what she'd already been through. Excluding, of course, certain events occurring in The Death Cure that shouldn't be mentioned and will never occur as long as she had anything to do with it.

Other than those events, she couldn't imagine anything worse. She'd been held at gunpoint, kidnapped by a gang, reconnected with the man of her nightmares, had a bounty put on her head, watched her saviour be killed, wandered through the completely unfamiliar underground of a Crank-ridden city in the dark, narrowly escaped some psychos, wandered through the Scorch for a bit and watched her best friend burn to death in a lightning strike.

It was quite the list, now that she thought about it, and she hadn't even mentioned all the awful stuff that had happened during her time in the maze.

By midday, she'd walked a good few miles, managing to fit in a couple more songs along the way. Both original pieces. One was a pop song named 'Scorched City Sweetheart', while the other was a rap which she decided to call 'Guns in the Sun'. They'd both make it to the album, she decided. She'd have to come up with a sick beat to put behind 'Guns in the Sun', though. Her beatboxing wasn't really going to cut it when all she could do was spit a little bit and make grunting noises.

Thomas could probably do a better job at the grunting noises, at least.

"This is good," she said aloud, pulling out her drink bottle and taking a quick sip of water. Not nearly enough. "We're getting some exercise, nobody's tried to kill us for a while, and I haven't even tripped on anything in the last five minutes."

Trace then tripped over a rock.

As she righted herself, however, she heard a sound. Not a good sound. A bad sound. A very, very bad sound.

The kind of sound she'd learnt to dread. The kind that screamed at her to run.

So she did. She sprinted as fast as she could towards the mountains, reaching into her pocket and pulling out her handy-dandy kitchen knife while she ran.

She tried to escape the sound of the engine.

It rumbled from behind her, getting impossibly loud, and she risked a quick glimpse over her shoulder to look.

It was them. Definitely. She had another ute following her now. She could see four of them in the car itself, five in the tray on the back. They'd packed themselves in, filling the vehicle to the brim.

The Corpse Collectors were coming at her in full force.

And Trace had nowhere to hide.