1. FIGHTER - the maze runner, newt

Chapter 2

Boys - Lizzo
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      "I'm Alby. Leader and eldest of the Gladers." Alby spoke, stretching out his large hand to me.

My eyes flickered down to his muscular hand, debating whether or not to take it. My thoughts wandered back to when the "Gladers" were calling "dibs" on me and only cared to know if I was "hot". Was this boy one of them? Should I trust them? For all I know, these "Gladers" have kidnapped tens of girls and I'm just another victim. My eyes lifted back up to the older boy's eyes, throwing on a stony expression to match his.

Alby retracted his hand quickly, a look of annoyance painting across his face. Impatience radiated off him as my eyes began to wander around and away from the leader.

I looked around at the group of boys with a blank expression, masking my feelings of anxiety as I inspected every inch of them.

I watched the Gladers around me fiddle with their clothing and their hair, trying to wipe the dirt from their clothes and face, and comb the grass from their hair.

My lips twitched up at their efforts to impress me while breaking my serious façade that I somehow vowed to appear in. They all looked to be between the ages of twelve and eighteen, dressed in dirty, tattered clothing. The only thing that cleaned them up in the slightest way was their glowing smiles which illuminated their faces covered in filth.

"I'm Newt," An English voice snapped me out of my thoughts. My head turned as my eyes searched for the voice. Standing beside me with a quirked smile, stood the attractive boy that helped me out of the box. He leaned to the left, his squinting brown eyes searching me over. I watched his hand twitch to move forward but slowly drew back, at the memory of my rejection to shake Alby's hand.

His smile was soothing. He radiated kindness as he kept a polite distance between us, his brown eyes nervously flitting across my face. I felt myself grow the tiniest bit more calmer in his presence.

"Do you have a name?" Alby asked firmly, taking my attention away from Newt.

My eyes flashed down to the ground in thought as I tried to recall my name. My mouth hung open in attempt to reply but the only thing that came out were unintelligent babbling.

"Do you remember?" Newt crossed his arms and stared down at me with soft eyes.

I began to silently stutter, my mind completely blank of what to say or how to start. I scratched the back of my head absentmindedly, feeling the lump in my throat grow. I gnawed on my bottom lip as I squeezed my eyes shut trying to piece together my name.

I heard the young male's voice return, in sharper whispers. It felt like he was speaking through a weak radio frequency. His voice was staticky and hard to understand. Every time I would tilt my head, it felt like I was turning a dial to find a better signal. The only thing I heard from the young male was the same "eh" sound I recalled hearing when I was in that box. I tilted my head to the right slightly and the static became almost silent. But it sounded like it was the boy having difficulty saying the name. The second letter was almost inaudible when the young male spoke. It sounded like someone's reaction to good food: "Mmm".

I began to copy the sounds under my breath, as I desperately tried to reach the memory.

I could feel the sympathetic stares from the boys around me burn into the back of my neck, but they were currently irrelevant to the situation at hand.

I can't remember my name. I'm a tad stressed.

Sounds were thrown across my mind in different fashions and patterns that it began to make me dizzy. It felt like the young male was screaming the word but there was a thick wall of glass separating us.