Different | The Maze Runner / Newt ¹ ✓

{0.5}

Disclaimer:

I do not own The Maze Runner, but if I did, I would have made book!Alby more like movie!Alby because he was so chill.

-✼-

I expected it to take a while for us to get to the Homestead with Newt's limp, but he was surprisingly quick on his feet and we managed to walk across the Glade in a few. We heard angry shouting and some unpleasant words, so we rounded the corner and stopped at a small window with light shining through. A small wooden sign by the door had the word "Bathrooms" carved into it.

"Shuck it," Newt sighed as he rubbed his forehead. Stress lines started to wrinkle the skin there. "Chuck probably scared the livin' daylights outta whoever was in there."

I paused, listening carefully. I thought I heard Gally and Thomas's voices mixed in with the shouting. Great. "Aren't you going to stop them?"

Newt waved his hand in dismissal. "Nah. We've gotta let the Gladers fight their own battles sometimes."

"With Gally, there seems to be a lot of fighting," I mumbled.

"Hey," he began, "like I said before, Gally's just hot-headed. He disagrees with a lot of people, but he's not a bad guy. I'm not saying you have to love him- I sure don't. But he's been through a lot. He wasn't always this way."

I nodded. I understood that the things people went through sometimes changed them as a person. In Gally, whatever happened to him made him hard. Untrusting. Liable to make fun of the new people in the Glade. But the person Newt was describing didn't seem like the Gally I just met. Whose eyes had discreetly burned with anger the moment I'd spoken Thomas' name. Who looked at me like he knew my every secret.

Newt seemed to notice my troubled expression and declared, "You don't have to worry about him."

Without saying anything else, we wordlessly began walking to the front door of the Homestead. When we walked inside, Newt gave me no time to look around before he was leading me up the rickety stairs. They seemed to have been patched up several times. Some boards were uneven; I had to carefully watch my footing in order to prevent myself from tripping.

"These are where the Keepers' bedrooms are, along with mine and Alby's. You'll be sharing a room with Minho- he was the only one not to protest to not having his room all to himself anymore. It might be because he's never there, I dunno."

As we got to the top of the staircase, I asked, "What do you mean, the only one not to protest?"

Newt shrugged, his hair bouncing off his shoulders. "Well, if all of them had wanted to keep their rooms to themselves, you would've shared a room with me. However, Minho didn't seem to mind. We'll be moving a cot in there for you to sleep on. Don't worry; it'll be the most comfortable and pleasant cot our Builders can create."

I nodded and glanced down the hallway. There were several doors on each side, some of which had splinters poking out of them. I didn't know how many there were exactly, but there seemed to be at least ten- five on each side of the corridor. The air smelled strongly of boy.

"Minho's room is the third door on the right," Newt told me. "Mine's two doors down if ya ever need anything. Alby's right across the hall from me. Try not to have nightmares. Minho might slap you with his pillow if you start screamin' in the middle of the night. He's a Runner, so he likes his sleep whenever he can get it."

"Ru--"

"Ah, ah, ah," Newt scolded before I could finish my question, raising an eyebrow. "No more questions until the Tour tomorrow, got it?"