❝i am sick of the chase❞

"THOMAS!" MINHO EXCLAIMED AS THE BOY CLIMBED INTO THE ROOM THROUGH THE VENT AGAIN. They all sprung out of the sitting positions that they had been in on the bed and rushed over to him.

"We gotta go. We gotta go right now," Thomas informed them with a panicked voice as he clambered to his feet and ran to look out the window of the door. He then ran back to one of the beds and grabbed a mattress to put against the door while all of his friends asked him questions about what the hell he was talking about. "They're coming. Come on. We gotta go. They're coming for us. Paige. She's still alive."

Frypan whipped around to look at Aris who had climbed out after Thomas. He looked traumatized about whatever he and Thomas saw that got them all worked up. "What happened in there? Aris, what happened?"

"Thomas, can you just calm down and talk to us?" Newt asked because Aris had not responded as the boy he was talking to tied the door closed with one of the sheets that he had pulled off a bed.

"She's still alive," Thomas repeated, but when he saw the looks on their faces and their signals for him to elaborate, he sighed, "Ava."

The name sounded familiar to Iris, but she could not remember from where. It was strange because everyone she knew except Teresa was a boy, so she had no idea where she would've met a female. Jem seemed just as confused, and he questioned, "Ava?"

"Will you just turn around and talk to us?" Newt questioned because they were all really confused. No one had explained anything to them, and as far as they knew, Thomas and Aris could just be going crazy from dehydration or lack of sleep or something.

"It's WICKED! It's still WICKED. It's always been WICKED," the leader yelled at them, still holding the mattress against the door, and that was enough for them. That caused all of their eyes to be widen, immediately jumping into action, ready to follow him. He ordered for them to follow him under the vents as fast as possible, and it let out somewhere down the hallway. He climbed out and gestured for them to follow him. "Okay, let's go."

"You guys go ahead. There's something I gotta do," Aris told them, staying in the vent and causing them all to furrow their eyebrows at him. Where the hell was he going? Neither Jem nor Iris had still never spoken to this kid directly, so they had no clue whether they trusted him or not. Thomas seemed to, and Iris trusted Thomas. Jem was still iffy about that. That seemed to be good enough for the rest of them.

Thomas, who was about to start running, came back and stood above the vent so that he could look at Aris, seemingly worried about the kid. "What are you talking about?"

"Trust me, it's important," the other boy assured them, and Iris wondered what could be so important other than running and finding a way out. How could they trust him after only knowing him for about five minutes? "You guys wanna get out of here, right? Just go."

"I'll go with him," Winston said, and Aris backed up so that he could join him in the small space. The girl scanned Aris's face for any sign of disappointment that someone was coming with him to keep an eye on him, but he seemed more relieved than anything. The last thing she wanted was for Winston to get killed too, but she figured that if Aris was a murderer, Winston could take him because he was kind of scrawny.

Thomas nodded at them before starting to sprint down the hallway. "Okay, Winston, go! Go! Come on."

"Hey, Thomas. You maybe think yelling and stomping isn't the best idea?" the curly-haired girl asked, calling up to the front so that the boy could hear. Of course, they wanted to move fast, but maybe they could run a little softer. "I feel like that might draw them to us."

"I don't think he cares," Frypan breathed out to her after they got no response from the boy in the front that was too focused on finding a way out. Iris had a feeling that he already knew the way out because he seemed to know exactly where they were supposed to be going. Then again, maybe he was just really confident in his hunches and did not want everyone to see that he actually had no idea where they were going. Either one was a possibility.

Minho shouted to Thomas as they ran down a hallway, "You sure we can trust this kid?"

"You don't want to know where we'd be without him," the other boy answered, and Jem imagined that it would be dead in the boy's mind. Thomas had still yet to tell them exactly what he saw and what got him and Aris so freaked out, but he was really determined to get them out of there. They also did not know how he knew that whatever this place was was WICKED.

They turned a corner, and everyone skidded to a stop. Iris almost stumbled into Newt, who was in front of her, and she had to move to the side a little bit so that she could see what made them pause so suddenly. The lady that did all of the tests on her and bandaged up her arm was standing in front of them with a very confused expression. "What are you kids doing out?"

Just then, the alarm started going off, and the lights began flashing above them. Perfect timing, Jem thought. The doctor lady seemed to know that she stood no chance against the five of them because when they started sprinting down the hallway, she ran in front of them as if she were being chased.

"Freeze!" ordered a voice from in front of them as they ran, and Iris turned her head slightly to see a guard running at them down the hallway that they were supposed to go down with some sort of gun in his hand. He started firing, and they all ducked swiftly, somehow avoiding whatever was in the gun. The girl had no clue what it was, but she knew that it was not bullets. "Stay where you are!"

Minho called to them as they turned around and started running the other way, "Why are they shooting at us?"

"Minho! What the hell are you doing?" Thomas yelled, and they all stopped and turned around to see that the boy had stopped and was now facing the way that the guard would be coming in just a second since the hallway he was on and the hallway they were on were perpendicular.

The guard continued to yell, letting them know how close he was to turning, and after a second of waiting, Minho sprinted down the hall. Just as the guard came into their sight, the boy jumped and kneed him, slamming him against the wall so that he fell unconscious and onto the floor. All of the Gladers and the woman ran over to him and stared down at the man on the floor. Iris exclaimed, "That was badass."

"Right?" her friend that just knocked out the guard asked with a small smile.

Thomas, knowing that there was no time for chit chat, grabbed the guards gun from off of his body and cocked it so that he would be ready to shoot if he needed to. Then, he waved them down the hall. "Okay. Let's go. Come on. Let's go."

"Dr. Crawford, are you here—" started one of the lab doctors when they got to where Teresa was supposedly being kept. Then, the guy realized that the woman was not alone. Thomas pushed forward with a gun and pointed it at all of them. "Wait, wait. Okay, okay."

"Where is she? Where is she? Get over! Get down!" Thomas demanded, and they all got to their knees as he scanned the room. He spotted a curtain and handed the gun off to Minho before running over to it. He pulled it back, revealing a sleeping Teresa.

Newt grabbed some of the bandages from one of the tables and used them to tie up the doctors' hands. Jem followed his lead and did the same. "Give me your hands!"

"You're never gonna get away with this," Crawford muttered to the boy, causing him to just glare at the woman and tie the bandages extra tight so that maybe it might slightly cut off her circulation for a little bit.

Frypan, who was staring out the window to watch so that they knew when people were coming and how much time they had, called to them, "Guys? They're coming! Where do we go?"

"Frypan! Move!" Newt yelled, and he wasted no time in pushing a table over so that all of the glass bottles and supplies on it fell to the ground and shattered everywhere. Then, the blonde boy grabbed the table and wedged it between the door and another table so that it barricaded the door.

Minho pointed the gun at Janson and the guards trying to break through the door and made sure that everyone was behind him. "Get back! Get back! Okay, we gotta get outta here! Where do we go?"

"Everyone stand back!" Thomas yelled, and then, he grabbed a stool from beside him and slammed it against a glass window. He did that a couple times as Iris and Minho urged for him to speed it up, and finally, he got some assistance. "Come on! Newt! Help, help! Ready?" They hit it together, and the glass shattered, falling everywhere. Teresa, who did not have any shoes, threw a blanket over the windowsill so that she did not cut her feet, and Thomas helped her over. "Watch your feet!"

"Hurry! Let's go! Thomas!" Minho shouted before throwing the gun over to Thomas so that he could climb over at the same time as Iris. She got a small piece of glass in her hand, and it started bleeding. But it was definitely not the worst injury that she had sustained. Jem noticed it, however, and he pocketed some of the bandages for her later.

Thomas caught the gun and turned around to go out the door behind them. "Let's go! Stay behind me!" The door opened, and they were about to go when a guard stopped them. He was standing right in front of them,a dn Thomas did not give him a chance to say anything before he held up the gun and shot him. Something came out, landed square in the guys chest, and started electrocuting him.

"Holy shit," Jem muttered as they watched the twitching man on the ground in front of them. Then, they started running again down the hall and toward wherever Thomas was leading them.

"Okay, come on! There it is! There it is!" the boy yelled when they saw the door down the hallway that they had just turned to. They sprinted to the end, Thomas taking out his key card as he ran. He slid to the ground in front of the scanner and started swiping the card. "Shit. Come on! No, no, no!"

It wasn't working. He kept scanning and scanning, but it kept beeping, letting them know that it was not working. They heard footsteps behind them and whipped around to see Janson and a couple of guards with shields walking down the hall toward them. The man called, "Thomas!"

"Open this door, Janson!" the boy ordered, handing the key card off to Iris so that she could keep trying and grabbing the gun. He pointed it at Janson as he yelled, ready to fire.

"You really don't want me to. I'm trying to save your life," Janson told him, holding his hands in the air as if he meant no harm. "The Maze is one thing, but you kids wouldn't last one day out in the Scorch. If the elements don't kill you, the Cranks will. Thomas, you have to believe me. I only want what's best for you."

Thomas scoffed, "Yeah, let me guess. WICKED is good?"

"You're not getting through that door, Thomas," the man informed him, shaking his head. His face fell all of a sudden as a sound caused them all to whip around. The door behind them was beginning to open from the bottom, and for a second, Iris thought that their countless attempts with the key card had worked. That was until she saw two figures standing on the other side. Aris smiled, "Hey, guys. Come on, let's go!"

"Come on! Thomas! Come on! Let's go! Go, go," Minho told them, and they all ran through the door to the other side. Thomas started firing shots at the men, but the shields blocked them from being electrocuted by the devices. Finally, he ran out of shots, so he just threw the gun at the men and started sprinting toward the door.

"Stop him!" Janson demanded before speaking into his radio. "Shut the main vault door!"

The Gladers yelled at their friend because the door was starting to close, and he was not going to make it. "Thomas? Come on, Thomas! Come on!"

The door was about two feet off the ground, and Thomas was still a couple yards away. Everyone was worried until he dropped down and slid swiftly under the door, and it closed right after he did so. Holy shit. That was cool, Iris thought as they all started running. Winston ran over to a knocked out guard and grabbed a small gun off of him.

The blonde girl did not even notice that Jem's hand was hovering over her waist as tey ran, ready to push her along or pull hre to safety. They ran until they reached the door that they had came in after they were 'rescued' from the Maze. Thomas looked panicked for a second, not knowing how to get out, so Iris said, "Move out of the way."

She grabbed something that looked like a wheel and spun it, using all of her strength, and took a step back. Everyone's eyes widened when the doors started opening to reveal the dark desert. They ran outside and past the guards watching the outside. They ran over a dune and laid down behind it so that the people searching for them wouldn't be able to see them. Iris sighed in relief as she glanced between her friends, her eyes lingering on the one boy who had been staring at her for a moment now.

They were out.