❝ never trust a survivor
until you find out
what they did
to stay alive ❞
―Kurt Vonnegut, Bluebeard
[ the maze runner × the hunger games ]
No one was ever happy in District 12. They were the poorest among the distric...
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Newt grabbed Rosalind's hand just in time before she fell to her death.
The Crank that had tackled her wasn't so lucky―its hold on her waist slipped and it tumbled over the ledge with a blood-curdling shriek.
Newt dropped his axe and gripped her with both hands, exerting all his remaining strength into pulling her up. After a good minute of struggling, she finally swung her legs over and he pulled her up, his grip on her arms tight and firm. Ignoring the glass shards cutting into the fabric of their pants, they sat there right next to the ledge, eyes wide, too paralyzed by what had happened to say anything. Rosalind started sobbing, and despite only knowing her for less than a day, Newt pulled into a hug, and she buried her face into his shoulder.
"It's okay, it's okay," he muttered.
They huddled together for a long while, breathing heavily. Dusk fell, and the last traces of daylight disappeared behind the city horizon, the sun dipping down for a final goodbye. The two tributes retreated away from the window edge and into a corner of the room.
"Your leg," Rosalind said, her eyes widening as they trailed over the bleeding wound in his ankle.
"It's fine," he said quickly, trying to cover it up, but it was too late. In one swift motion, she reached into her backpack and pulled out her first aid kit, setting to work immediately.
"Rose, really, I'm okay―"
"No, you're not," she said sharply, tending to the wound. "How did you even get this cut?"
"Fought another tribute before you came along," he muttered.
She pursed her lips but didn't say anything else. Newt found himself observing her as she worked, watching the way her delicate fingers cleaned the wound and bandaged, the way her eyebrows furrowed in concentration, her eyes unblinking.
"Thank you, by the way. For saving me back there," he said softly.
To his surprise, the corner of her lips twitched. "We are allies."
"You know what I mean. If it weren't for you I wouldn't be here right now."
"And if it weren't for you, I would be a flatten pancake on the pavement right now." She finally lifted her gaze up to his, not bothering to mask her smile now. "We're even, okay?"
Newt couldn't help but smile back. "Okay."
She started to work on his arms, which were riddled with tiny cuts from the glass shards, but he protested, arguing that she needed to tend to her own injuries too. Finally, after a few minutes of them bickering like the stubborn twats they were, Rosalind finally caved in, and while Newt helped pull out glass shards from her backpack, she cleaned up the cuts along her arms.
