~A/N: Just a heads up: this chapter's a real turning point. Not much plot wise, but TEA WILL BE SPILT.

~Sara – (Present Time)~

Immediately after setting foot in HQ station, after four days of travel, the guards hauled everybody out as if performing a prisoners-of-war stunt. However, Sara didn't even have time to protest as two guards gripped both of her arms and pulled her away, separating her from the group.

Everyone entered full-blown-panic mode, and people started talking over each other, making an unintelligible echo of human voices. Sara complied to the guards solely because of her urge to clear things up with her uncle.

But Newt's screams made her look back with sorrow at his distressed state. "Sara!"

Another guard stepped in to take him with the others, and even though the guard struggled, Newt eventually gave in out of frustration.

One of the guards holding her arm roughly turned her head to face the front as they rushed her along the hallway. For as much as a fugitive she was, Sara was disgusted at the lack of respect when she only contacted Janson to have a civilized talk. She willingly brought everyone back. The least she expected was to be guided professionally to his office, and not hauled over like a wild animal in captivity.

Finally, she stood before his office door. It was ajar, giving Sara the sinister vibes of someone who'd come a long way to consult a conjurer. Once the door was opened completely, making no sound at all like her imagination had just fantasized, she was ushered inside. Two guards stood by the door as it closed, and the rest of the guards were allowed to leave.

And now, she was face to face with the man in charge.

"Sara." His voice was too calm, but the force of his lips as he said her name, confirmed her initial suspicions. The man was obviously furious.

"Right." She raised her hands in the air. "You got me. I'm sorry, okay? I know what you're gonna say, but there are more important things I need to talk to you about."

"Like what?" He raised an eyebrow.

"'Like what?'" She sputtered with disbelief. "The Safe Haven! What kind of sick joke was that? And may I ask, what was supposed to happen after that if I hadn't called you?"

Janson let out a snicker, which offended her like he had no idea. He was actually laughing when all of their plans were basically shattered out in the Scorch.

"You don't understand anything about the trials, Sara. All that time planning for what? This is inevitable," he said, before crossing his arms.

Sara frowned before cautiously asking, "'All that planning?' I only escaped once to go help my friends. It wasn't that long ago."

"Alright, fine. If that's how you want it, let's approach this a different way. You're coming with me," he said before walking past her and out the door. Assuming he expected her to follow him without questioning, she headed out after him.

He led her across hallways in which she'd never set foot before, possibly not even knowing they existed. With his back facing her, she listened to the beeping sounds of what appeared to be a keypad, and a massive aluminum door magically seemed to pop off from the wall. It opened with a hissing sound, and she caught a glimpse of the interior. It was so white it almost looked surreal. Every inch of the place was padded.

The kind of resolve in which he spoke to her only led her to wonder how screwed she really was. Was he gonna lock her in or something?

The answer turned out to be even more terrifying. Half of her assumptions were correct. This was a place where he planned to keep people captive and tortured, but instead of Sara being the person he intended to lock up in there, she saw her.

Her face was incredibly beat up, her hair tangled and disheveled, her clothes torn and dirty, and she looked like she'd been deprived of food.

"Becca!" Sara rushed to her and lifted her head, but the woman's bright green eyes were the only thing gloomily shining on her face now tainted with blood. She groaned before Sara brought her hand back down, causing her head to hang low.

Furious, Sara turned to her uncle and her breathing quickened, which didn't seem to have the slightest effect on his nonchalant nature. Sara was furious but also terrified. How did he discover her—them?

"Why?" she asked, and her voice cracked. Then she lunged at him and started beating his chest like a madwoman. "Why!"

He gripped her arms and tore them away from his chest, pushing her back. "Why?" He scoffed. "You both tried to ruin the project of my life. If only you knew how much it cost me to get here."

"Alright, you know what? We're not doing this. J—just tell me what I have to do—I'll do anything!" Sara panicked. She knew she'd sacrifice anything for Rebecca; the woman had always done it with her without a second thought.

"No," Rebecca mumbled and started whimpering.

"What do you want from me so you can let her go? And Chuck! Where is he?!" Sara tried to lunge at him once more, but he was prepared this time, pushing her away with minimal effort.

"He's safe with Lisa," he replied calmly.

"No," Rebecca said with more clarity, but still in between sobs. Sara turned to her in confusion.

Janson glared at Rebecca and turned Sara around to push her out of the room. Sara protested fiercely but eventually gave in, knowing the only way to save Rebecca was if she talked to him, perhaps proposing a truce.

"Don't do it, Sara! Please don't!" Sara heard Rebecca's voice just before the heavy door shut with an echoing thud, making a hissing sound in the process.

Don't do what?

Janson pulled her by the arm, and they made their way back to his office.

"Alright, you know everything. It's over, I get it but—" Sara rambled, but he raised his palm to shut her up just as they entered his office once again. She sighed, cautiously finding the right words. "What do you want from me?" She finally asked the million-dollar question in a low, desperate voice.

He eyed her cautiously, then rubbed his chin before smirking. "I want you to stay with me, my dear."

Sara threw her hands in the air. "Enough of that klunk! You don't give a shuck about me, not even for being your niece. Why so desperate for me to stay with you? You know what? I don't even care anymore! If that's gonna save the people I care about, I'll do it. I'll stay," she finished, furrowing her eyebrows in anguish.

Did she mean that? Was she truly willing to sacrifice her happiness to save others? She'd already failed miserably in trying to save everyone that she had no motivation to keep fighting Janson anymore. Perhaps if she accepted his offer, that could be the only solution to save them all. She was hoping it wasn't a sacrifice that would cost her too much. All he wanted was for her to stay with him, didn't he?

"Perfect. I see we're headed to a good start," he said, smiling at her. "But listen to what I'm about to say. I don't care about our family affiliation. That's not why I looked for you in that old dumpster of a town." He wrinkled his nose as if the sole memory of her home disgusted him.

She pursed her lips and released air through her nostrils. "Don't you dare disrespect my home!" She pointed a finger at him as she stared daggers at his disgusting rat face. Wiseman wasn't anyone's dream home, but her home was a million times better than living with this monster. "It used to be your home too, don't forget that."

"What home? I've given you a home!" he shouted, patting his own chest. He had the audacity to shove that at her as if he'd done her the greatest favor of her life.

He killed her family, for shuck's sake.

Clearing her throat, she clung to her dignity—or whatever was left of it. "Answer the question. What—do—you—want—me—for?" She muttered word for word slowly, only growing more irritable by the minute.

"You can be the solution to the Flare outbreak," he simply replied.

"Yeah..." she whispered in a ridiculing tone, "...and we don't live in Alaska, right?" The absurdity of the whole situation was overwhelming.

He lowered his eyebrows. "Don't do it for me, because I know you'd never. Do it for your friends. You can save them all."

"Right, so now I'm one of your lab rats? What are you—are you gonna dissect my brain now?" She raised an eyebrow, completely testing her luck around this entire conversation. "I thought we all had the Flare. I don't see how I qualify for such honor." She crossed her arms.

He started laughing again, and it was really starting to bother her that it was all he ever did anytime a word came out of her mouth. "Dearest Sara... you're immune."

Her eyes grew wide as she assimilated the simple words. She didn't trust him, and she wasn't about to go get her brain dissected just because he said she was immune.

They were all told they had the Flare—in fact—it was Janson himself who said so. And if it was true that she wasn't going crazy, then what about her friends who did have the Flare? Her only concern now was how to help them.

With a certain level of doubt, she continued to argue against him. "Out there, I was acting completely out of my senses. I didn't feel like myself. I felt the stupid disease control me. How do you explain that, huh? You think I can just accept your word for it? I'm sick of lies, Janson. I know I'm infected."

"You want to know who put those awful thoughts into your head?" he asked, raising his voice. As she looked back at him, stone-faced, he blurted out the last thing she'd expect to hear. "You just came back from seeing her."

She was about to lose her mind.

She'd never screamed so loud at someone in her entire life. She didn't even recognize her own voice, growing hoarse as she spat out the purest hatred at him. He didn't even flinch, not a single vestige of fright in his eyes, which only made her hate him even more.

How dare he bring Rebecca into this when Sara knew that he was the one behind it all?

As Sara gave herself time to calm down before she tried to murder him, she kept telling herself that it was just another one of his tactics for mentally manipulating her into doing what he wanted. And she had no business negotiating with him.

It dawned on her that she never wanted to call Janson in the first place. Thinking it through, she would've never done it in a rational state of mind. And Janson somehow discovered everything Rebecca and Sara did to ruin the experiment of his life.

She suddenly looked back at Janson with pure terror in her eyes.

"You're lying. Just admit it. Rebecca Paige would never do such a thing." Sara tried to incorporate as much confidence into her voice as possible. "You know why I know you're lying?" He raised his eyebrows. "Because I never had an implant in my brain. Becca never did that to me. It was all an act," she snickered, proud that she could finally stump him, even over a minor thing.

But he wagged his finger at her, instead. "Why did you think you were acting completely out of yourself in the Scorch? It wasn't the Flare, Sara. I already told you that you're immune. It was your implant. Rebecca put that in your head a long time ago, and she used the technology to manipulate your thoughts out there." He pointed a finger out into the distance, with no smiles, no smirks, a genuine look of affirmation plastered on his face.

"No," she whispered in horror. "Why would she do that? Why would you think I can't assume it was you who did that, then blamed her? You're torturing her! The answer's obvious," she finished as tears poured out of her eyes.

If an implant sat in Sara's brain, then it meant he did that to her. And he wanted to blame Rebecca. Sara only wanted another solution, anything that would let her free Rebecca. But she wasn't gonna let him experiment on her just because he claimed that she was immune to the Flare.

He sighed, as a father would if he were greatly disappointed in his daughter. "I'm sorry, my dear, but with a shattered heart..." he placed his hand on his chest dramatically, "...I'm compelled to show you the truth the hard way."

"What—?"

He didn't even give her time to express her confusion before he signaled to his guards to grab her by the arms and force her after him. She'd been hauled from one place to another ever since the berg landed and was growing tired of it all.

Sara gritted her teeth as she tried to outstretch her arms to break loose. When that didn't work, she tried throwing kicks at their legs, hoping to at least trip them and make them loosen their grip on her arms enough for her to fight them off. But once again, all that did was reinforce her helplessness.

She didn't understand the need to go back to Rebecca, but her anxiety only increased as Janson opened the door to her torture room. He ordered the guards to push Sara inside, and then leave the three of them alone in there.

"Alright, Rebecca," Janson announced. "Your turn."

Appalled, Sara stared at her as she burst into tears. But what really disturbed her was that Rebecca wasn't crying like before. It was with fierce agony. Sara knew the woman wasn't in pain anymore, because she wasn't crying as soon as they walked in. It was just as Janson pronounced those few words. It was hard to know if she should trust her intuition, but it all looked like a premeditated plan to incriminate Rebecca.

"Janson, don't make her say anything she doesn't want to say," Sara pleaded with him.

He only looked at Rebecca straight in the eyes, ignoring Sara. "You know she hates lies. You can't hide this forever."

Rebecca's cries turned into bawling. A desperate, suffocating cry that didn't seem to end.

What is going on?!

"Janson!" Sara screamed. "Stop this!"

"Speak!" he shouted in Rebecca's face.

Sara moved forward to stand in between them. He was gonna hear her out one way or another. "You don't have the right to treat her like that. All you do is use her. You abuse her in so many ways that it makes me sick," Sara muttered, not bothering to hide the disgust in her voice. "She's the most honest, caring, and intelligent human being I've ever met, so you will not—"

"Sara," a soft whimper interrupted her defense. Sara hadn't realized Rebecca's cries subsided as she was talking. With a quivering gasp, Rebecca caught her breath, "... It's true." She shut her eyes tightly as more tears fell.

Everything seemed to halt its natural course. Starting with Sara's own breathing, then the existing general noise seemed to die down, nothing more than a mere echo. Sara could even imagine the particles in the air halting in place.

"W—what?" Sara's voice came out in a squeak, almost inaudible.

"Keep going," Janson urged the woman to continue, with a softer voice.

There was a torturously long pause before she gained the courage to speak again. "You went into the Maze with it."

Sara shook her head decisively. "No—no, no—Janson is forcing you to say that. He—"

Rebecca interrupted her again, with a little more composure. "No, he's not. He might be a liar, but he's right on something. I couldn't live with myself if I wasn't completely honest with you."

"What do you mean?" Sara asked softly, sounding defeated. She wasn't sure she was ready to hear what Rebecca had to say.

"I did it in your sleep... the surgery. It was a few days before I sent you in," she said, bowing her head.

Sara was speechless.

Janson stepped in, like the cherry on top of the cake of misfortunes. "Sara, it's about time you start listening to your uncle."

Sara glared at him, unwilling to let him speak anymore, and she suddenly grabbed Rebecca by the shoulders and started shaking her, screaming at her and demanding to know why she never said anything about this before.

"Why couldn't you at least ask me!?"

"I was afraid! I was afraid you'd refuse. It was necessary for me to keep track of you. It saved your life, Sara," she rambled desperately.

In a panic, she grabbed Sara's shirt, passing her hands down her braids—anything—to get her message across. Sara didn't know what to think of any of it. She was confused, but at the same time, so many other things made sense now.

All those dreams she had back in the Maze, even in the Scorch. It was all Rebecca, trying to show her things. And all the while, she was thinking WICKED had enough technology to induce lucid dreaming without ever manipulating the brain. Sara thought Rebecca was using advanced technology with her, but it was the same old thing WICKED had done to her friends.

"You should've told me! I thought WICKED tech could do the job just fine without an implant. No wonder I always had all those headaches!" Sara breathed deeply as new tears formed in her eyes. "And why did you make me carry a tracker?"

"I didn't want you to suspect anything," Rebecca replied, miserably. "I knew you'd think I was acting just like WICKED, and it's true!" she wailed.

Still gripping her shoulders, Sara grimaced, staring at her with so much pain in her eyes. Sara started crying again, her face gesturing at Rebecca a series of agonizing 'why's.'

It shouldn't be a huge deal, she told herself. Just forgive her already and move on.

It was difficult. Sara couldn't picture herself forgiving her and acting as if nothing had ever changed. It had changed. Massively. She put her life in the hands of this woman. She trusted her like a daughter would trust her mother. Rebecca was her family before Sara ever met up with Newt or her friends.

They confided in each other; they had such a special kind of bond. It was unbelievable that for years, she'd been doing the one thing Sara always despised about Janson. Sara hated secrecy like nothing else, including the time she was forced to endorse it herself. And for the secrecy to come from someone held in such high regard to her like Rebecca, it was too much.

"I'm so sorry," Rebecca whimpered as she tried to hug Sara, but Sara backed away from her. It broke her heart that Janson was treating Rebecca so cruelly, but it also didn't lessen the graveness of Rebecca's actions.

With the deepest regret, Sara rejected her affection for the very first time in her life. At her reaction, Rebecca's breath hitched in her throat as she took a sharp intake of air, her bright green eyes expressing such a devastated hint of remorse.

"Rebecca," Sara said, her eyes averting as she thought about the awful dream she had the other night. The woman perked up at her call, a bit uncomfortable at Sara's omission of the nickname she used with her before. "You blame me for the death of all those kids in the Maze?"

"No, darling—"

Janson pulled Sara away from her. "That's enough. I still have something important to discuss with you," he told her, words to which Rebecca started to panic. She begged him not to do that to Sara, even though Sara had no idea what it was about. "Just watch, Rebecca. I want you to see it for yourself," he said. Then he turned to Sara. "Now that we've cleared everything up about your immunity, I certainly hope you'd be willing to make one final sacrifice for humanity."

Assuming he was talking about dissecting her brain and donating it to science, Sara went on a frenzy. This had been one of her toughest days, with the most shuddering confessions she'd ever heard. It was the last moment in which she wanted to think about a contribution to science.

"I refuse to take part in anything that has to do with you or WICKED," Sara muttered angrily at him.

They'd ruined her life. They'd ruined Rebecca for her as well. But Sara blamed Janson of all people. If it weren't for him, she wouldn't be living this absolute hell. There were plenty of other kids who were probably immune, so why was she the 'chosen' one?

"If it isn't you, we all die. The world dies, Sara. Is that what you want?" Janson asked, furrowing his eyebrows.

Sara could honestly not give a shuck about the world anymore. Everything she loved had disappointed her one way or another. Something always had to go wrong. She didn't want to keep living like that anymore; she was drained. The world had exhausted every bit of hope left in her... and there probably wasn't enough love left in her heart to do something to mend its broken state. She didn't understand why she should be the one responsible for its possible redemption like Janson put it.

"I don't care anymore, Janson," she replied, her voice lacking enough energy.

Janson straightened up, sighing deeply. Sara knew he couldn't force her into it, and he was sure to keep trying just about anything to convince her.

"There was a time..." he began, and Sara prepared herself to space out during his upcoming storytelling, "...When little children were tested to see if they were immune or not. I made sure to get the children of my family tested before anyone else. That means you..." His face turned dark for a moment, "...And my little Margaret."

Hearing her name brought Sara's full attention to his words as the memory of her long-lost cousin tore at her heartstrings.

"She wasn't immune," continued Janson, and Sara felt the aftermath of sadness. She knew there was nothing else to do since her cousin was dead, but Maggie couldn't have had a better fate had she lived. "But you... well, let's just say that the results from your testing were quite astonishing."

"How so? I was immune, okay, what's the big deal?" Sara asked, showing almost no interest.

"There was something different with your DNA," he said, and Sara clenched her jaw. She thought she'd already heard the craziest thing yet. "You were somehow born with a genetic component that can regenerate itself. It acts similar to a DNA sequence that was engineered years ago. It was used to repair damaged DNA, and eventually, scientists discovered how to eliminate viruses with the technology. Of course, the discovery caused a series of problematic affairs in the medical industry, which is why it was never really offered to the public anymore. And the technology itself can't combat the Flare virus."

Sara laughed, scratching her head. "Okay, I don't care that some miracle, man-made enzyme does that." She flared her hands in the air mockingly. "What are you trying to prove?"

He gave her a stern look. Of course he had more to say, but she was so tired of his voice alone. "We've tried it here in HQ during the first outbreak and when the virus mutated. But what I found in your DNA was simply unique. That special gift nature gave you acts similar to the engineered nuclease, but it works to eliminate any kind of foreign invasion in the body," he said.

"How do you know it works?" Sara asked. She had to be sure he didn't just plan to experiment on her without having solid evidence that it actually worked. Who would do that?

The day had been insane. First, she went from thinking she had the Flare, then to being immune, and finally to actually being some kind of miraculous cure. It made no sense.

Back to square one. Since the beginning of her new life, nothing made sense and now it held true more than ever, despite her fierce efforts to prove it wrong.

"It's been tested before," he replied. "One little boy was once like you. Clandestine organizations conducted lab tests and discovered the component in his body. One of their employees caught the Flare, so they took DNA from the boy and inserted it into part of the infected person's genome. The man was cured, but seeing it as a lucrative opportunity, he refused to share the discovery. He killed his colleagues and kidnapped the boy, hoping to gain profit out of that. But his obsession with the boy became a sickness in and of itself. Infected individuals who'd heard rumors broke into his home one night and killed him to capture the boy for themselves. But it's believed the experiment went wrong for the boy, because he'd developed tumors that killed him before anyone else could benefit from his DNA."

Janson spoke with such solemn seriousness that it kind of disturbed her. Nonetheless, there was still one thing that didn't settle with her.

If people like her had been found, why hadn't science invested in a safe way in which those people could help cure others, instead of spending all their money on this whole experiment? Why did all her friends need to be a part of this experiment if a cure was already found?

He seemed to read her mind as he gave her a blunt look. "Sara, statistically, only one billionth of the entire population has that component in their DNA. You're one of them."

"So... where are the others? Why build an entire Maze and put every kid in these trials if there's a cure with only those 'special' kids? Why do you want me only?" Sara outstretched her arms, irritated to the core.

"Because you're the only one left," said Janson, and Sara stiffened. "The others were killed in the middle of Crank attacks, starvation, among many other factors. They all died. The sun flares and the outbreak left the world in destruction. And with you, we now have the resources to experiment. The risks are still high since we've never experimented on people like you, so we had to give the world another solution. This is why WICKED was born, and this is why we're doing the trials that you both..." He glared between Rebecca and Sara, "...Tried to ruin."

Sara had heard enough. She couldn't believe the way he was talking about her, as if she were some kind of lab rat. That was how he'd been treating every single one of her friends. She wouldn't allow him to do the same to her. Her friends didn't deserve to be a part of a doomed experiment either.

"My answer to your flattering offer is no, and that's final." She gritted her teeth, before she started shouting again, wishing everything would be over no matter how. "All I want is to be away from you! I'll find another way to help my friends, but I'm not gonna be the world's redeemer."

Right as she finished, she saw a familiar woman enter the room with a file folder in hand. She remembered Rebecca telling her all about her.

Lisa. She was the one that had taken Chuck then. What was she doing there, helping Janson out?

"In that case..." Janson clicked his tongue, gesturing to Lisa to hand him the file in her hand. He flipped it open, and rapidly scanned it while letting out a long sigh. "You leave me no other choice." He continued flipping through it, as if searching for something in particular. "Aha, here it is." He pointed to a specific page. Then he handed Sara the open file, pointing to the very top of the page. "Read this through, then we'll talk again."

"Sara, no," Rebecca whimpered. "He's just—"

Janson furiously pressed his finger against his lips, ordering her to absolute silence. And Sara didn't even mind that much, because she couldn't even know if what Rebecca was saying was true anymore.

She looked down at the open file in her hand, and with nimble fingers, she flipped to the front cover just to see what it was that he wanted her to look at as a whole. And she could feel the color drain from her face as she realized that it was Newt's file.

She had in her hand the one relic that held all of WICKED's experimentation on Newt. It felt so surreal; like she was carrying most of Newt's life in her hands.

Terrified, but also desperately curious, she flipped to the page Janson told her to read. As her eyes scanned every line, she read an explanation all about control groups in scientific experiments, and the differences found between them compared to Immunes. There was also an fMRI scan of two different brains. One was from a control and the other was labeled 'Immune.'

And the last of her disgraces fell upon her like a crashing wave. She shut the file, but her fingers seemed to lose their function, making it drop from her hand.

Sara began to hyperventilate and feel lightheaded. Her vision started to blur, and she could only see a shadow of what seemed to be Rebecca kneeling on the floor, her face buried in her hands as she cried.

After what Sara figured was a mild episode of a panic attack, she stared back at Janson with the most defeated expression.

Nothing, absolutely nothing in the world mattered to her anymore. And that false hope that she still clung to, it all vanished from existence. For once and for all.

"You..." Sara could barely manage to spit the words out at him. "You made him go through your stupid trials, only to expect him to die!" Saying it out loud and upfront was worse. The Gladers had a terrible experience with WICKED, but what they did to Newt specifically, was a total abomination.

Finding out why Janson really wanted Sara to stay with him was one thing. Finding out about Rebecca's dirty secret was another. Yet discovering that the love of her life wasn't immune to the Flare was the last straw.

Sara was expecting life to be gracious just this one time. She was told not all of them were immune, and she was expecting the majority of the Gladers to be immune. And she certainly never counted on Newt being part of the few unlucky ones. When it was told to her like that, with previous warning and a somewhat promising statistic, the only thing she could do was cling to the positive side of things. No matter how unlikely it was for them to happen. And when it wasn't the case, she would have no idea what to do with herself.

"Sara, I'm gonna be very honest with you," Janson said, in a reprimanding tone. "I'm certain you've noticed some sort of peculiar behavior in Subject A5," he blurted out, and Sara's head shot up, the memories of the last few days rushing through her mind like a movie in fast-forward.

She gasped loudly. "You mean he...?"

Janson nodded. "It's advancing quickly for him, and it only accelerates as the hours go by. He'll go through all of it. You've seen Cranks out in the Scorch. That's how he'll end up."

Sara furrowed her eyebrows and grimaced as she stared at the floor with horror. Flashes of her nightmare with Newt appeared behind her eyes as she shut them tightly. The extent of her imagination, the pure image of Newt as a Crank past the Gone, sent freezing shivers down her spine. The hairs on her arms stood up.

A sudden feeling of denial grew in the pit of her stomach.

No, Newt can't end up like that, she repeated in her head. Then, as if the voice in her head were an actual person she could hear, it started screaming louder, Newt can't end up like that! Every nerve in her body recharged with a newfound conviction. Now the voice, secure and affirmative, shouted, Newt won't end up like that!

"No!" Sara screamed out loud. Her voice was hoarse and wild, and the suddenness of her outburst startled them all. "He can't! I won't let him!"

"You're letting it happen!" Janson shouted back. "You're being selfish with the one person you claim to love!" he accused her.

The shouting was almost drowned by Rebecca's fierce sobs on the floor. Lisa only averted her eyes, uncomfortably avoiding the alarming scene.

"By the way," Sara said slowly, lifting a warning finger, "his—name—is—Newt. He's not some product you exploit in a human black market!"

But Janson didn't hold back. "If you really loved this boy, you wouldn't leave him to his own mercy. You would give up your life for your love. You can end this whole thing, Sara. You've just got to do one little thing," he said tenderly, extending his arm out for her. "Come with me, and we'll prepare you for this as soon as possible. You can save him, and quite possibly all of humanity."

Something was still off, and Sara couldn't help but wonder, "Why do you suddenly care so much about what happens to Newt? You saved him from a bullet wound out in the Scorch, and now you're telling me to save him. Why? Are you kidding me? What else are you gonna do to him!?"

"Nothing," he replied calmly, making Sara forcefully release air through her nose. "I saved him only to bring you back. I don't care if you help him or not, I just know that you will, and that's why you'll stay. I'm giving you that chance, it's convenient for both of us."

Sara laughed humorlessly as she pointed at him warningly. "See, it's that way of treating Newt as if he were nothing that makes me want to set myself and this entire building on fire. Not a single cell of ours would ever be exploited again."

Janson smiled and shook his head condescendingly. "Does that even surprise you? Newt's just as good as dead. One less control Subject doesn't shift the balance. There're plenty of... beasts like him out there—"

Sara pounced on her uncle, wrapping her hands tightly around his neck as his venomous words ignited all her fury. All her remaining energy was channeled into her actions, and she just shook him, grunting with wild rage as tears formed in her eyes.

He began to gasp for air, but quickly and much rather unfortunately for Sara, he took all the air out of her with a simple blow of the knee to her stomach. She let go of him and dropped to the floor as it was now her turn to gasp for air.

"No!" Rebecca screamed and sobbed.

Adjusting his neckline, he cleared his throat before addressing Sara once again. "Complain all you want—have all the tantrums you want, but at the end of the day, it will always be only in your hands to save Newt. And you'll help me save the world too. It doesn't hurt to try. That little conscience of yours doesn't let you sleep at night, does it? Then make the right choice, Sara."

Her own consciousness of how selfish she'd been tied a knot in her throat. She was so worried about herself and what she'd been through, that she forgot all about everyone else. Sara was so absorbed in self-pity, that she never even stopped to think about others—especially Newt of all people! And she treated him so terribly the last time they had a conversation, thinking he was changing into a bad person. It was the Flare already affecting him!

And she realized Janson would never let her forget her mistakes.

If she didn't do this, she was essentially killing everyone she loved. She had to do it. For Newt. For her friends. For humanity, despite her differences with her uncle.

"I will," she finally blurted out as she attempted to stand.

Rebecca raised her head from her hands, staring at her with utter shock as Janson turned to the woman with a satisfied smirk.

The weight of it all, the disgust with herself and her thoughts before knowing the truth—disgust with everything she was letting WICKED and Janson do to her in order to go through with this—got to her stomach.

With one hand on her stomach and the other over her mouth, she made a run for the door.

But she only made it a few steps before the contents of her stomach ejected from her mouth. She leaned over with hands on her knees, heaving and retching violently, only wishing death could absorb her into its painless darkness.