If I could do it all again

Chapter 17

Thomas's P.O.V~

Me and Newt sat at the front quietly while the rest of the Gladers poured into the room. Once everyone had found somewhere to sit Alby stood up and adressed everyone. "Okay so, firstly. I would just like to clarify that if anyone still didn't believe these two when they went to bed last night, you now have absolutley no reason not to believe them now. The proof is outside." There were no murmers semt throughout the room when he stopped talking which is incredibly reassuring, because it means that they all either believed us yesterday or believe us now. Which is much better for us to work with. "Okay, good. That's what I wanted to hear. So I'm not going to blabber on for too long up here, because I don't know what the mechanisms of our plan are, like these shanks do. So I'm only going to say one thing before letting them explain what they want us to do." He looks down at me and Newt, before looking back up at the Gladers. "I know that to all of us in this hall, we are entrusting our lives to a greenie. However, we are also entrusting our lives to Newt, so I don't care if you don't want to take orders from a greenie. He knows better than any of us, about what's to come. But most importantly, Newt trusts him. If Newt trusts him then I trust him. So, do what they tell you to aswell as you can and we can all get out of here alive." He looked back down at the two of us and nodded. "Right, I'll let these two explain what's going to happen here then." As he made his way to an empty seat Newt turned to me. "You or me Tommy?" I think for a second before turning to face him aswell. "You explain preparations. I'll explain what happens when we get into the maze. Sound good?" He nods quickly tapping my knee with his middle finger. Calm down. He's right. I need to stay calm right now. He looks down at me from the front of the room. "Okay, I'm gonna explain everything to do with preparing to get out, Tommy's gonna handle the escape." They all nodded murmuring to themselves.

"Right. Basically, the last time we were there they took our weapons away so don't prepare something huge cause it will no stay with you. However, Tommy has apparently already thought of this as Gally is no doubt about to bring to my attention." He nods his head before speaking. "Yeah, he asked me if we had anything small enough to hide in sleeves and things like that." Newt nods looking down at me. "Any reason?" I nod quickly. "Yeah, remember that first night in the scorch when I kicked that Crank off of you?" He nods slowly flinching slightly at the memory of it. "Do you remember why I had to kick it off of you?" He shakes his head slowly. "No why?" I gesture to the table of weapons. "Because we didn't have any weapons. Literally a swarm of Cranks running after us and we had literally nothing to protect ourselves with." He nods his head at me. "Yeah, okay good point." He looks at Winston sadly, I follow his gaze before snapping it back to Newt. "Alright, Gally and Fry can you two handle that for us?" Frypan nods slowly. "Yeah, I have a ton of small knives in the kitchen so it should be no problem for everyone to have atleast one." Newt nods before continuing.

"Okay, that's one thing out of the way." He looks down at me, Minho and Ben before looking for the rest of the runners. "The Runners, are to take the packs. It isn't strange to anyone watching for you to take packs into the Maze and such, meaning it won't draw any attention if you all carry them. The stuff packed inside will be distributed as evenly as possible so that we aren't giving one runner too much to carry." All of the runners nodded looking over at the supply table. "Okay, so second to last thing, food, Zart I need you and the track-hoes, to gather up as much as you can without it looking too suspicious. Anything that can last for a long time, especially in dry conditions. Fry we are gonna have to let someone in your kitchen to do part of that job aswell." Fry waves his hand infront of his face. "Don't make much of a difference now anyhow." Newt smiles at him before facing the rest again. "Okay. Last thing. This is for once we get there in preparation of leaving. But basically, WCKD allow you to carry water bottles around all day. So all of us need to carry one at all times. And it needs to be full. I'm not saying don't drink it, I'm just saying if you do you need to make sure you fill it back up as soon as you possibly can. Got it?" They all nod in unison. "Good that. Right Tommy, come talk us through the plan." He sits back in his seat as I stand up infront of the Gladers.

"Okay. First thing's first, Minho, you know the maze better than anyone else, so you'll lead the run in." He nods quickly before leaning back in his seat. "Okay, all of the runners are going in first, we're, sorry you're..." Minho and Ben cut me off by holding up their hands. "Thomas, firstly, we made you a Runner so you can say we're. Secondly even if we hadn't you'd still have the right to call yourself a Runner." I nod at the two of them quickly. "Right, thanks. Okay, the runners are going to lead the group. We're more accustomed to running in the maze. That doesn't mean however that I want anyone at the back. The only order we need to have in terms of getting to the Cliff is that the Runners are in the front. So basically behind the runners until we get to the Cliff stay as close together as possible, almost like a pack. That make sense?" They all nod at me with a couple mumering between themselves. "Okay, so believe it or not getting to the Cliff is actually going to be the easy bit. Once we get there if we don't manage to catch WCKD off guard there's gonna be a storm of Grievers waiting for us. Meaning we need to leave here as soon as possible so I'm gonna talk fast." They nod in understanding again.

"Teresa, you already know your job right?" She nods quickly moving closer to Chuck. "Good that. Okay. Even if we manage to catch them off guard there will still be one or two Grievers that manage to turn on before we can all jump down the Cliff." I look down at Newt as he shudderes at the memory. "When these guys turn on you have to take them out as fast as possible. They might be strong but when they first turn on they're slow and clumsy." Minho nods smirking slightly. "So how do you want us to deal with them Tommyboy?" I think for a second before answering. "Okay, based on what happened last time, even if they're slow they're still clever, so it's going to be hard to get past them. So... Ben we have 10 spears right?" He nods. "Minho, how many runners?" Minho doesn't even stop to think before telling me. "6 including you." I nod quickly. "Thanks. Okay so. 6 of the spears are gonna go to the runners. The last four are gonna go to Gally, Winston, Jeff and Alby." I look through the crowd to spot the 10 of us.

"This does however mean that you aren't allowed to go down the Cliff until all the Grievers are dead. Or until everyone else is down and we can make a run for it. Newt, you remember the code right?" He nods chuckling darkly. "The shuck thing is etched in to my nightmares Tommy, of course I bloody remember it. Wait..." He stares at me in horror. "No not happening Tommy." I nod my head. "Newt. You're gonna go down the Cliff with Teresa and Chuck to input the code so that the others can make their way down. While the 10 of us make sure everyone gets there." He shakes his head fiercly. "Tommy that is not an option." I look away for a second before looking back at him. "Newt, that's what's happening. I have to be up top, and you're the only other one who knows the code." He sighs heavily and sits in his chair. "Fine." I take a deep breath before continuing. "Once everyone is down the Cliff, there's gonna be WCKD research lab. Everything that happened there, is fake. That's the plan then."

Newt stands up quickly. "You heard him. Everyone get out and finish preparing. I need to talk to Tommy. Alone." They all flinch back and all but run out of the Homestead. "Tommy are you an idiot?! What do you expect me to do if you don't make it down the Cliff? Leave and pretend like nothing happened? Is that it?" I shake my head. "Newt, please. You're the only other one who knows the code and everything that's meant to happen. So if I don't make it down, you can lead them through the Scorch." He shakes his head slowly. "Tommy, you better make it down the Cliff. Because I am not happy with you asking me to leave you to die." I don't know what happened, it might be the stress of everything that can go wrong, but I snapped. "But it's okay to make me actually kill you? With my own two hands." It was only after I had spoken the words that I realised what I'd said. "Suck Newt, I..." I couldn't bring myself to finish my sentence and left the homestead. "I'm sorry." I ran over to Ben and Minho to find them staring at me. "What happened?" I look between them confused. "What do you mean?" The pointed at my face. "Thomas you're crying." Minho patted me on the back quickly. "Go. I take it you said something about Newt's death that you didn't mean. So go sort yourself out and apologise to him when you're calm." I smile at him quickly. "You sure?' They both nod. "Yeah, I mean the both of you gave pretty clear instructions." I smile again and stand up properly. "Thanks Minho." Ben laughs and pats my shoulder. "Go quick, like you said we need to leave soon." I nod before turning around. "Give me 10 minutes." They hum in response as I walk towards the wall of the Maze almost hidden by all the Ivy.