James Dashner - The Scorch Trials

Reluctantly he turned and ran with Brenda, her hand still clutching his shirt as they sprinted into the darkness.

Thomas didn’t notice his heart pounding, or have time to contemplate what could possibly have caused the explosion. All he could think about were the other Gladers, now separated from him. Blind, he ran with Brenda-forced to entrust his life to her completely.

“Here!” she yelled. They made a sharp turn to the right; he almost stumbled and fell but she helped him stay on his feet. Once he had a good pace, she finally let go of his shirt. “Stick close to me.”

The sounds of destruction behind them faded as they ran down this new path, and panic lit up inside Thomas. “What about my friends? What if-”

“Just keep going! Better for everyone to split up anyway.”

The air cooled as they moved farther down the long hallway. The darkness deepened. Thomas felt his strength slowly returning and he caught his breath quickly. Behind them, the noises had almost stopped. He worried about the Gladers, but instinct told him it was okay to stay with Brenda-that his friends would be able to fend for themselves if they’d gotten out. But what if some of them had been captured by whoever had set off the explosion? Or killed? And who had attacked them? Concern seemed to bleed his heart dry as they ran along.

Brenda took three more turns; Thomas had no idea how she could know where she was going. He was just about to ask when she stopped, putting a hand to his chest to hold him back.

“You hear anything?” she said through huffs.

Thomas listened, but all he heard was their own breathing. Everything else was silence and darkness. “No,” he told her. “Where are we?”

“A bunch of tunnels and secret passages connect the buildings on this side of town, maybe across the whole city-we haven’t explored that far yet. They call it the Underneath.”

Thomas couldn’t see her face, but she was close enough that he felt and smelled her breath. It didn’t reek, which surprised him, considering her living conditions. It kind of had a nonscent, somehow pleasant.

“The Underneath?” he repeated. “Sounds stupid.”

“Well, I didn’t name it.”

“How much of it have you explored?” He didn’t like the idea of running around down there without knowing what was ahead.

“Not much. We usually run into Cranks. The really bad ones. Way past Gone.”

This made Thomas turn in a circle, searching the darkness for he didn’t know what. His whole body tensed with fear as if he’d just jumped into ice water. “Well… are we safe? What happened with that explosion, anyway? We need to go back and find my friends.”

“What about Jorge?”

“Huh?”

“Shouldn’t we go find Jorge, too?”

Thomas hadn’t meant to offend her. “Yeah, Jorge, my friends, all those shanks. We can’t leave them behind.”

“What’s a shank?”

“Never mind. Just… what do you think happened back there?”

She sighed and stepped even closer to him, pressing her chest against his. He felt her lips brushing his ear as she spoke. “I want you to promise me something.” She said it softly, in barely more than a whisper.

Chills broke out all over Thomas’s body. “Um… what?”

She didn’t pull back, just kept speaking into his ear. “No matter what happens, even if we have to go alone, you’ll take me all the way back. All the way to WICKED, to that cure you promised Jorge-he told me about it in the storage room. I can’t stay here and slowly go insane. I can’t do it. I’d rather die.”

She grabbed both of his hands in hers, squeezed. Then she rested her head on his shoulder, her nose nestled against his neck-she had to be standing on the tips of her toes. Each breath from her sent a new wave of chills across his skin.

Thomas was enjoying her being so close, but it seemed so bizarre and out of the blue. Then he had a surge of guilt, thinking of Teresa. All this was stupid. He was in the middle of a brutal and ruthless attempt to make it across a wasteland, his life on the line, his friends maybe dead. Teresa could even be dead. To sit here and cuddle with some strange girl in the dark was about the most absurd thing he could think of.

“Hey,” he said. He wiggled his hands from her grip and grabbed her upper arms, pushed her away. He still couldn’t see anything, but he imagined her there, looking at him. “Don’t you think we need to figure things out?”

“You still haven’t promised me,” she replied.

Thomas wanted to scream, couldn’t believe how strange she was acting. “Fine, I promise. Did Jorge tell you everything?”

“Mostly, I think. Though I’d already guessed it the second he told our group to go on without us and meet at the Tower.”

“Guessed what?”

“That we were going to help you get through the city in exchange for you taking us back to civilization.”

This made Thomas worry. “If you came up with that so quickly, don’t you think some of your friends did, too?”

“Exactly.”

“What do you mean exactly? Sounds like you figured something out.”

She reached out and placed her hands on his chest. “I think that’s what happened. At first I worried it was a group of longer-gone Cranks, but since no one chased us, I think Barkley and a couple of his buddies rigged an explosion at the Underneath entrance, tried to kill us. They know they can get plenty of food somewhere else, and there’re other ways to get down here.”

Thomas still didn’t understand why she was being so touchy with him. “That doesn’t make sense. I mean, kill us? Wouldn’t they want to use us, too? Come with us?”

“No, no, no. Barkley and the others are happy here. I think they’re a little more gone than we are, starting to lose their rational sides. I doubt the idea even occurred to them. I bet they just thought we were all gonna gang up and… eliminate them. That we were making plans down here.”

Thomas let go of her, leaned his head back against the wall. She pressed in again and wrapped her arms around his middle.

“Uh… Brenda?” he asked. Something wasn’t right with this girl.

“Yeah?” she mumbled against his chest.

“What are you doing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t you think it’s a little weird how you’re acting?”

She laughed, such an unexpected sound that Thomas thought for a second she’d succumbed to the Flare-become a full-blown Crank or something. She pulled away from him, still chuckling.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she said through a schoolgirl snicker. “Guess we came from different places, that’s all. Sorry.”

“What do you mean?” He suddenly found himself wishing she’d hug him again.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, her merriment at his expense finally subsiding. “Sorry for being so forward. It’s just… pretty normal where I come from.”

“No… it’s okay. I… I mean, good that. I’m good.” He was glad she couldn’t see his face, because it must’ve burned so red she’d start laughing all over again.

He thought of Teresa then. He thought of Minho and the others. He had to take control. Now.

“Look, you said it yourself,” he said, trying to pump confidence into his voice. “No one chased us. We need to go back.”

“Are you sure?” She had a suspicious tone.

“What do you mean?”

“I could get you through the city. Find enough food to take with us. Why don’t we leave all of them? Make it to this safe haven place on our own?”

Thomas wasn’t going to have this conversation. “If you won’t come back with me, fine. But I’m going.” He put his hand against the wall to guide himself and started walking in the direction from which they’d fled.