Burning; TST ➵ Thomas

T W O

Thomas pointed at the door that leads to the common area.

"There's a sign right out there that says this is their room. Teresa ... Agnes and Amelia ... Blue. No mention of shanks named Aris and Alec," he spat. Something in his tone must have made the strangers realise that the situation was serious.

Aris held out his hands in a conciliatory gesture.

"Look, man, we have no idea what you're talking about. They put us here last night. We slept in those beds," he clarified.

Thomas turned to face Newt, not knowing what to ask next. Newt seemed to be in a deep thought before looking back at the two strangers.

"Who put you here last night?"

Aris shrugged off Alec's arm off his shoulder and proceeded to throw his arms up in the air. He then let them come back down and slap against his sides.

"I don't know," he sighed. "A bunch of people with guns who rescued us told us everything would be okay now."

Thomas interrogated him, questioning where the people had rescued them from.

Alec's face fell, the colour seemed to drain. He sighed. Aris opened his mouth to speak.

"The maze, man. The maze.".

-

"Maybe you should sit down," Thomas suggested. "I think we have a lot to talk about."

Aris began to start asking them the same questions.

"The Maze. The Grievers. WICKED. You name it."

So much had happened, he didn't know where to start. The worry over Amelia and Teresa started to take its toll on him. Newt stepped into the conversation once again, convincing the two strangers that they weren't liars - that they were telling the truth.

Minho entered the room, a pack of Gladers standing behind him on the other side of the doorway. Their faces were scrunched up in disgust at the stench. Thomas took a step to the side and introduced Minho to the two new boys.

"Let's take down these top beds and move them around the room. Then we all sit and figure out what's bloody going on," Newt suggested.

"No. First, we have to find Amelia and Teresa. They have to be in another room," Thomas shook his head. Minho intervened and explained he scoped the area - there weren't any more rooms around.

Thomas rushed out of the bedroom and began to search the faces of the hanging bodies. None of them were the girls. Relief flowed through him. He walked around the boys' and the common room - attempting to find some kind of secret door somewhere in the area.

Frustrated, he returned back to the room that was supposed to belong to Amelia and Teresa. Just as Newt had ordered, the top beds had been unhooked from the lower ones and placed around the room against the wall.

Minho turned to see Thomas and patted the empty spot next to him, gesturing to seat down. Without responding, Thomas obliged. He zoned out for a short while, only returned to reality when Newt started to pace back and forth.

"You lived in a big maze, on a farm, with walls that closed every night? Just you two and a few dozen girls? Were there creatures called Grievers? Were you the first and last to arrive? And did everything go buggin' nuts when you did? Did you come in a coma? With a note that said you were the last one ever?" Newt catechized. Thomas' eyes following him as he strode across the room.

Aris and Alec took a double take.

"Woah, how do you know all of this?" Aris questioned before Newt had even finished.

"It's the same shucking experiment!" Minho exclaimed. "Or the same... thing, whatever. But they had all girls and two boys, we had all boys and two girls. WICKED must've built two of those mazes, run two different tests!"

Thomas furrowed his brows and shifted his gaze from Newt to the two strangers.

"Did they call you the Trigger?" Aris looked at Thomas, confusion written across his face. He nodded. Thomas prompted with another question, he hesitated in asking but he continued.

A question about telepathy was what Thomas had asked. Aris' eyes widened.

Can you hear me?

The phrase appeared so clearly inside Thomas' mind that he originally thought Aris had spoken aloud. But no - his lips didn't move.

The bright-eyed boy repeated his question. Thomas hesitated and replied with a yes.

They killed her, Aris said back to him. They killed my best friend.