Y/N reached out to grab Gally, but his figure flowed through her fingers like he wasn't even there. He wasn't real. Her heart fell through the floor. This wasn't the underground. It never had been. It was all a lie. Their job here had never been their own. Everything had been one massive lie.

That moment in the tunnels when Gally had said something wasn't right...WICKED got them. She knew they had.

The only thing that felt real was Minho. After having been spinning in circles, trying to grab onto Gally's petrified ghost, she returned to her running partner and tried to shake him awake. "C'mon, Minho. Wake your lazy ass up."

She tried to joke to keep her sanity. It didn't help. All it brought was tears to her eyes. She knew that nothing about any of this was right and that WICKED somehow had captured them. They weren't safe. And yet, the only thing she could remember right now was the times back in the maze when Minho would pretend to be asleep. Y/N would spend far too long jabbing at his sides and trying to roll him over to wake him up while Minho tried to hold back a smile.

This wasn't the same. This time he really wasn't waking up no matter how hard she tried. She sent a fist into the concrete and let out a cry. As she lowered her head, everything began to fade. All of her senses checked out and things went black.

Just moments later, she opened her eyes—her real eyes. The world materialized around her...she was in a dimly lit, pale room. She was strapped to a slightly reclined medical chair and beside her was Minho. He was still unconscious. WICKED did have them. Panic may have set in once again if the girl had any capacity for it, but she didn't. Enough energy was stored up inside to keep breathing because Minho was still here, but her ability to fight back was near to none. They'd been on the run so long, WICKED always seemingly three steps ahead, she was tired of running into dead ends.

"The boy is waking up too," A doctor whispered. In a few seconds, Minho shot up panting. He looked to Y/N and froze. He was coming to the same realization. His eyes dropped to the floor in a mixture of heartbreak and shame that dug deep into Y/N's chest.

"Convenient you two woke up at the same time." The doctor smiled smugly. "You finally figured it out. I wasn't expecting it to take two months...but."

Y/N looked over to Minho who was struggling so hard to keep his head up that he hardly had a reaction to the mention of how much time had passed. "Two months?"

"Yeah, you know," The doctor placed down some papers and sat down in a chair which he scoot closer to Y/N and Minho. "The gas we initially knocked you two out with was designed to keep subjects unconscious, but in a dream like state, for a couple of days. Just long enough for transport. You two got hit pretty hard."

"Big difference between a few days and a couple of months." Minho grumbled and tried to test his restraints.

"What kind of a bullshit lie is that?" Y/N snarled. "You trying to make yourselves feel better? You knew damn well that gas doesn't just affect someone for a couple of days."

"Hmph," The doctors expression suddenly fade from slightly roguish to completely murderous and unprincipled. "You kids are a little more spirited than the rest."

"Spirited?" Y/N scoffed. "No, we're scared. We're tired. You've disfigured our lives enough and yet still have the audacity to do this."

"Or maybe it's your fault for holing onto any kind of hope and putting any trust in that Lawrence guy who trade you for Bliss." The doctor fought back. "Maybe, it's your fault for ever letting yourself you're anything more than a lab rat."

Y/N's nose wrinkled up and she bit her tongue. Those words cut her deep. She felt Minho's presence beside her weaken. He'd felt them too. Why wasn't he fighting back as well?

It was then she realized that his sudden change in demeanour hand't necessarily just been because of what the doctor had said. It was because standing behind those two doctors, probably having just listened in to their conversation, was Teresa.

The three former Gladers exchanged glances. What was Teresa doing here? Where were the others? What was going on?

Teresa seemed to fight for words. "Let them rest." She ordered, getting the attention of one of the guards. "Take them to a room."

Without words, Y/N and Minho were taken to a room. Where in the facility? Neither of them really knew. There was too much spinning inside of their heads to have even paid attention to the place they were brought.

Minho elect to lay down while Y/N began pacing back and forth in the room. "Is this part of it?"

"Part of what?" Minho asked.

"Part of whatever they're doing to us." She ran her hands over her head and kept them there, trying to open up her lungs to more air. "Why would Teresa be here but there's no sign of anyone else? Why didn't she tell us what's going on?"

Minho forced himself to sit up, propping himself up against the wall the bed rest against. He worriedly scanned the girl over. "I don't know."

Y/N froze. Finally hearing Minho speak seemed to hit a bit of a reset on her mind. She shift her eyes to look at him. He looked just as torn apart and confused as she felt. "What do we do?"

"There's not much we can do." He admit, downcast.

Those weren't words Y/N ever really expect to hear from Minho. If he was saying it though, if he saw the fight as impossible, then maybe there was a reason to settle down and try to think their way out.

"All we can do right now is rest and wait until someone finally explains what's going on. I know we can get Teresa to talk." He sighed and finally lift his gaze to meet Y/N's. "I don't think we can fight our way out of this one."

Standing there, letting Minho's words sink in, Y/N began to fall apart. For a moment, she almost convinced herself to question if this was even the real Minho. He would't give up like this, would he? But he wasn't giving up. He was rationally seeing the situation for what it was and it was that they were trapped. Fighting wasn't going to help them right now and Minho knew that.

Y/N felt her fists clench tight and she fought to hold back any emotion from breaking through but it was a losing battle. There was too much going on. From being drawn right into a trap, separated from all their friends but Teresa was the only one here, to having found out they'd been unconscious for two whole months. It was a lot to process and Y/N's mind didn't exactly have the energy for it.

Sitting there, Minho opened up his arms just a little bit. Nearly absentmindedly, Y/N fell into them and drew in as close as she could.

"We've managed worse," Minho sighed. "Let's just try to forget about if for a while."