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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Come Back Home - Chapter 7 - Final
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The first thing that entered everyone's mind was, 'what will Fawn think of this illusion?'
But when they all looked at where Fawn had last stood, she was gone. The girl sprinted across to Newt and flung her arms around him, Newt meeting her halfway and grasping her close in a tight hug.
"Im here." he whispered into her hair. "I'm here now."
"I missed you so much," Fawn sniffled, hastily wiping the tears from her eyes as she let Newt's ribs relax from the squeeze she gave them.
She saw that Minho, Frypan, Gally and Thomas had approached and were eyeing Newt skeptically, not sure if he was a ghost or not. Minho who had handed the twins off to Grace and Brenda, touched Newt on the arm as if checking to see if he was real and they could see the color drain from his face, only to return as tears appeared in his eyes. He didnt have to say anything as Newt pulled him into a hug.
"How is this possible?" Gally whispered, "You were dead! Okay now that I think about it you guys also thought I was dead.... but you were dead in the bottom of a destroyed city!"
"Death is only as real as you make it out to be," Fawn said, smiling at Newt.
Minho glanced from Newt to Fawn then back before he screeched. "Bloody hell! You fucking knew about this Fawn!?"
"MINHO!" Grace and Brenda scolded from afar, covering the twins' ears.
Fawn just smiled at Newt and that was when Gally had enough, throwing his arms up in the air. "Okay you know what? We aren't doing anything. ANYTHING until you two explain yourselves. Grace, you and Brenda watch the twins. We will be in the meeting house."
"WE should probably bring caliber and my buddy along." Newt said, pointing towards the stranger who had arrived with him who had sunny blond hair and a mask over his face.
Gally seemed wary of the tall stranger but sighed and nodded after a moment, leading the group to the Meeting House. Once everyone was sat around the table, or rather Minho, Thomas and Gally were sat and the others were standing like kids being sent to the principal's office. Frypan, Caliber and the stranger were standing off to the side like spectators.
Gally sighed as he looked between Fawn and Newt, "I get the feeling that there is more to this than I think but to start off, how are you not dead!?"
Newt turned to Caliber who handed him a bag which Newt placed on the table between him and the others. He reached in and withdrew something that made everyone gape.... it was Thomas's knife that had stabbed Newt to death in the Lost City.
"It wasnt by chance that you stabbed me with the knife that Caliber gave you." Newt explained. "That was on purpose."
Thomas's brow creased in confusion. "Explanation?"
"The legend that Fawn would always talk about, how our ancestors used a special plant to make their weapons and how the Assassins had carried on the tradition," Newt explained. "She never specified but the specific plant used in the making of the weapons is called Sol Defensor. English translation is Sun Defender.... or as Fawn always called it: Bubbles."
"You've got to be shitting me," Gally groaned. "So you're saying, the plant that is used in the Sting cure is also used in the creation of these weapons?"
Newt nodded. "That's why Caliber gave Thomas the knife. And it is also why when Thomas and I were struggling, I purposely grabbed his knife so that when I got stabbed, it would be by the Ancient weapon."
"So the knife works as like a cure injection?" Minho asked. "That's how you survived the flare?"
"Precisely," was Newt's response. "The knife did do a number on me but it was not deep enough to kill me. Not when I got help immediately. One other thing about Sol Defensor is that one of it's healing properties is sped up healing."
Frypan held up his hands, coming to join the conversation. "Hold up.... you said that it was the reason Caliber gave Thomas the knife.... but at the time no one knew that you had the flare, and how could you be sure that Thomas would be around you when you went crank crazy?"
There was no response, silence filling the meeting room and soon all eyes gradually turned to Fawn. "Im guessing this is where you came in?" Gally asked.
Fawn nodded. "Let's just say this will make a whole lot more sense if we start from the beginning."
Frypan leapt forward and pulled out several seats, essentially telling the others to sit which they did.
"So, the beginning?" Gally asked, arms crossed. "Where will that take us?"
"Back to when we were in the Glade," Fawn replied, instantly making the boys freeze, obviously having not expected it to go that far back.
"Fawn's unconscious!" Minho cried. "She got stung!"
Newt and Thomas didnt waste time in rushing to help the boy pick the girl up and support her between them. They quickly rushed through the door and didnt even bother to look at their surroundings as they lowered her to the ground.
"Where the hell are we?" Chuck whispered as he looked around at what appears to be a lab of some sort full of computers and screens.
"Not now Chuck!" Newt interrupted. "Fawn's seizing!"
The kids all crowded around the girl as she began to violently shake in her unconscious state. What they didnt see as they were busy worrying over Fawn was that Drake inched towards one laptop in particular, a small red light emitting from the screen as it scanned the dog and then it disappeared, just as Fawn began to slowly open her eyes.
"I have so many questions," Minho said, rubbing his temples. "First off, when you passed out from being stung.... was that fake?"
"Partially?" Fawn said, shrugging. "I did get stung which was kind of intentional because I knew that the sting of the Griever would reverse the blinding effects. I did faint because let's face it, that hurts like hell! But I actually woke up right before you guys laid me down but I kept faking my unconsciousness.... and the seizing was on purpose."
"So that is why Drake's collar is different," Gally muttered mostly to himself. "What exactly did the scanner do though?"
"It transmitted a message," Fawn explained. "His collar was specifically designed to relay messages between him and the mole that had been planted in Wicked."
She jabbed her thumb in the direction of the tall blond stranger. "He had found out that Teresa was going to be sent to the Maze so he sent Drake in first. When we reached the lab and he was able to upload a message to Drake's transmitter, that was the point when I found out that Teresa had never been memory wiped and was a spy."
Thomas's jaw dropped open slightly more than it had been. "You knew the whole time and you didnt tell anyone?"
"EEER!" Fawn replied, making a loud noise to cut him off. "Correction, I did tell Newt right away but I knew that if I told too many more people then it might accidentally leak to either Teresa or to Thomas and I'm sorry Thomas but I never trusted you to keep a secret from Teresa."
Thomas slumped in his seat but didnt argue, knowing that the girl had a point.
"Okay so how are we going to stop her from killing us?" Newt whispered as he and Fawn had taken a walk in the middle of the night so that they had privacy from the others who were sound asleep several feet away in the dark dunes of the desert.
​​​​​​​"I have that taken care of," Fawn whispered. "I have friends who are watching Wicked's every move and they will inform us if Teresa contacts them. But there's something I need to tell you. I know what the cure is."
Newt's eyes widened, "The cure for the Flare!? How?"
"Long story short, I knew I was going to get my memory wiped so I memorized the formula in a way that I wouldn't forget it and I planted the formula in the maze. But the thing is we cannot make the cure without Wicked. We dont have the resources or the supplies to make it."
"Okay so what's the plan?" Newt whispered.
​​​​​​​"We need to infiltrate Wicked. Once we get everyone to a safe place where Wicked cannot get to us, you know well enough that we're going to mount an attack on Wicked."
"That's to be expected." Newt agreed. "So do we infiltrate Wicked before or after?"
​​​​​​​"After," Fawn whispered. "I have always found that faking your death is the best way to throw people off. When I infiltrated Wicked before I went under the guise of someone named Jade Cross, someone I made up. When it was time for me to enter the maze as Fawn, I staged Jade Cross's death."
A smile crept onto Newt's face. "So you're telling me you have an alternate identity that you can use to get into Wicked?"
​​​​​​​Fawn nodded, "But because of Jade Cross's death, I cannot use that identity unless it is temporary because Wicked will immediately know something is up if a dead person enters Wicked."
"So what are we going to do?"
"We're going to fake your death," Fawn whispered.
"Just to make one thing straight...." Gally interrupted. "At what point did Newt contract the flare?"
"We suspect that I got it when we were attacked by Cranks in the mall but I didnt start to show signs until we had been rescued by the Snipers." Newt explained. "The original plan was for one of the Snipers to disguise himself as someone from Wicked once we attacked the Lost City, and shoot me with a blank to stimulate my fake death. When I contracted the flare, we thought of a better way to stage my death."
"By having Caliber cleverly give me the cure and Newt purposely stab himself in a crank rage," Thomas added, starting to figure out the plan.
"Precisely." Fawn responded. "The plan to fake Newt's death was to give him an easy in into the Wicked facility, disguising himself as a Wicked surgeon. That way he could easily have access to all the information I had stored at Wicked and he could send out all those orders for the materials."
"So Newt and your mole here," Gally said, nodding at the stranger. "have been working together for 18 months to create the cure and depleting Wicked's supplies?"
Fawn nodded. "everything was going according to plan but we weren't expecting Wicked to arrive as fast as they did when Teresa showed her true colors.... which was why the Snipers didnt arrive in time to stop them from taking Minho. So I sent a message to my friend in Wicked to ensure that Minho wasn't harmed."
"I was wondering why your eyes were familiar!" Minho gasped. "You were the guy in the doctor's mask that would always appear out of nowhere and say that you would "take over" the interrogation but you always just sent me back to my room rather than hurting me. I was always praying that you would turn up because you always showed up right before they started hurting me."
The eyes of the stranger crinkled, smiling behind his mask.
Minho grinned before looking at Fawn. "I do have a question. When we were escaping Wicked.... and we were stuck behind that one door and the key card wouldn't work.... was it you who got it to work when we weren't looking?"
Fawn smiled. "Actually it wasnt me." She said looking at the stranger. "It was him."
"It's not getting worse," Newt whispered to Fawn as the two dressed and prepared for their infiltration of Wicked. "They won't believe it if I dont crank out on them. You feeding me those berries every day has kept the spread at bay but I need my crank out to be believable."
​​​​​​​Fawn nodded. "I suspected that would happen. Here, I had Mace work up this inducer. It will induce the side effects of the flare, the drooling, the bulging veins and so forth but it will prevent the cure from reaching your brain. That way you can stay sane and know what you're doing."
"Perfect!" Newt sighed, placing the small vial in his pocket. "But we dont have activator. When Thomas 'stabs' me with the knife, I will get the cure but I need the activator."
​​​​​​​"That is why I convinced Gally to let me go with him to break into the vaults. Not only will Jade Cross's access give us an easy in if Teresa get suspicious but I'm going to break into one of the vaults where Jade Cross happened to store her supply of activator what she made during her life."
"So that's why you were so adamant about coming with me," Gally said, "You used Jade Cross's one time access to open the vault and retrieve some of the activator. But we never saw Newt take it."
"I applied it to him," Fawn explained. "The activator only has to touch your skin right? So I applied some to my mouth and that was why I kissed his cheek before he and Thomas bolted."
"OOOOOOOH," Thomas gasped. "That makes sense cuz you two were never big on PDA."
"Is there anything else that we need to know?" Gally asked.
​​​​​​​"This is not good," Newt whispered. "I know Minho is being protected in Wicked as we speak but we weren't counting on Gally being alive! Now everyone knows that Wicked has a supply of the cure! If they get their hands on the cure and somehow inject it into me before I can "die" our plan is fried."
"We're going to have to work around it," Fawn replied. "The vaults are thick so there is a slim chance Gally will be able to open the vault before you and Thomas turn up. No matter what Gally and Thomas say, dont stay with us and go with Thomas to get Minho. I'll make sure that we happen to leave the cure with Brenda and Grace rather than bring some with us."
​​​​​​​"You know Thomas or Minho will run to get the cure though," Newt pointed out. "And they are both fast runners. I dont know if it is enough time for me to stab myself while Thomas is trying to not kill me."
​​​​​​​"I have a diversion," Fawn replied, pulling out her tracker to reveal the little blinking dot. "This tracks Drake's whereabouts. It is also connected to Caliber, myself and you. Magnum is also sneaking trackers into all of the handguns that we will have in our possession so if Thomas or Gally give Minho a handgun, we can track Minho."
"So Minho will run to get the cure from Brenda and rush back to give it to me, what if they arrive just in the nick of time?" Newt whispered.
Fawn smiled as she nodded to the corner and Newt turned to see Caliber standing there, his bright orange hair reflecting the dim light of the room. "Caliber and the assassins will be assigned to make sure that Janson doesnt find us. So their presence will not be expected. If perchance they happen to be dressed as guards and happen upon whoever is racing to get the cure to you.... they will probably be able to stall them long enough for you to stab yourself."
"Why you little," Minho whispered, pointing an accusing finger at Caliber, "You were the guy who roughhoused me and Brenda!? So the Snipers coming and rescuing us was also an act?"
Caliber nodded, "Essentially. I released Drake first to slow you down long enough for us to ambush you."
"Drake," Frypan interjected. "Was Drake even missing in the first place?"
"No," Fawn replied. "Our separation at the mall was intentional because Caliber came and retrieved him. Originally we had him retrieve Drake because we were still planning Newt's death and we were going to have Drake ensure that Newt came back from the dead. But when Minho was taken and then Gally revealed that Wicked had the cure and he knew where to find it, we decided to use Drake as a diversion instead."
"Shit," Gally sighed. "You are seriously giving me grey hairs here Spitfire! Why didnt you guys just tell us that you planned on sending Newt to Wicked?"
"Well because Teresa still wasnt eliminated yet," Fawn pointed out. "And also one other thing.....We might have removed Wicked's trackers that they had placed in us when we were kidnapped.... but we aren't able to remove the trackers that Wicked put in us when we were placed in the Glade."
"WHAT!?" Frypan screeched. "There are other trackers!?"
"Not necessarily trackers but they send monthly updates to Wicked about what information was voiced to us: names, dates, places and so forth. It doesnt allow them to track us but if we ever mentioned a name or where a person is they could find that person. That was why I never told any of you other than Thorn members and Newt...."
Eyes slowly turned to Newt, "You dont have an internal tracker?"
Newt rubbed the back of his head. "Well....you see... Fawn was able to check when she infiltrated Wicked as Jade Cross.... which of us had trackers that were still active. Some trackers were disabled because of a sickness, an injury or something that caused the tracker to malfunction. When I got my limp.... I never told anyone this except Alby but.... I tried to kill myself my first year in the Maze. I jumped from the wall after having climbed up the vines halfway.... It didnt kill me but it caused my limp. Alby promised to keep it a secret if I promised to not do it again. But the fall was enough to destroy my tracker. And Fawn.... when she got stung but the Griever, hers also malfunctioned."
"And mine didnt?" Gally asked, "I got stung you know!"
"You got stung in the chest," Fawn pointed out. "The trackers are inserted into our lower abdominal cavity. That was why mine malfunctioned because I got stabbed in the stomach."
"FML," Gally groaned. "Just my luck."
"We had to keep things only between those who couldn't unintentionally alert Wicked to our plan. That was why this was only shared between myself, Newt and the Thorn members. We did have a collective agreement to not tell Grace though because with her hearing impairment, we didnt want her to accidentally say something without knowing that someone was eavesdropping."
"Reasonable," Minho said, "One final question though.... who is this guy?"
Fawn and Newt looked over at the tall blond stranger who had been silent this whole time. The boy reached up to the mask on his face and pulled it down so that it now hung around his neck, revealing his face to everyone. The silence in the room was so thick you could cut it with a knife. A single word escaped Minho's mouth which caused a thousand more questions to enter everyone's mind.
"Ben?"
*****
The blond boy smiled as he looked upon the Gladers whom he hadn't seen in over a year. "Good to see you again Minho, Frypan, Gally. You too Thomas."
Minho was unable to talk, hands covering his mouth and his body shaking violently in disbelief so Gally had to speak for his boyfriend.
"Explain yourselves now!" He ordered Fawn and Newt.
"Hey Ben," Fawn greeted as she crouched down with Drake next to the door which separated her from Ben who was making pained noises inside the pit. "I brought you some dinner."
The boy made no noise. The girl pushed the food under the door just before the boy tried to reach for her through the bars.
"Fawn get back!" Newt cried, helping pull the girl away from the bars as Ben tried to grab for her. "He's not himself anymore!"
"I just wanted to give him dinner," Fawn whispered softly as the boy and Minho led her away from Ben.
​​​​​​​What no one saw was that after they left, Ben dug into the food that Fawn had given him, not even caring that all the food she had given him was thickly laden with dark blue berries.
"You sneaky bastard," Gally muttered, causing Fawn to suppress a laugh.
"So you sneaked him the cure when we least expected it, which meant that we put him into the maze.... him in the process of being cured?" Minho choked. "How did he get the activator though? Or did the food you give him do the trick?"
Fawn shook her head. "Once you have been infected, the berries or the cure alone wont cure you. The activator needs to be given to set the cure in motion. The reason why some people like Thomas are immune to the flare is because they ate huge quantities of the berries back when they were kids. Newt, hated the berries which was why he wasnt immune. Thomas ate more than all of us combined which is why he is so immune that his blood is considered a cure."
"So how...."
"The Snipers picked Ben up after the maze doors had been shut," Newt explained. "They gave him the activator and he was completely cured. They did however drop his clothes into the maze just in case we went looking for him."
"So Ben was the one who was the mole in Wicked, the one who found out that Teresa was a spy, the one who got us out when we were captured, the one who protected Minho and the one who has been providing us with the cure?" Minho whispered. "Can this get any weirder?"
Newt grinned sheepishly and Minho narrowed his eyes at the boy. "What now?"
"This is the last thing I promise," Newt told him, holding up his hands in surrender. "But.... the reason why no one in Wicked survived the bombing that we staged just the other day.... is because for the past year Ben and I have been giving Wicked personnel a "cure" that we told them is a prophylactic against the flare.... but it is actually a microscopic detonator."
"You little shit," Frypan gasped, making everyone gape at him in surprise, having not heard him swear in a long time. "You blew up every Wicked person?"
"Yeah?" Newt said, cringing. "It sounds terrible but it was the only way we could ensure their demise and also ensure that no one would track us through our internal trackers anymore."
********
Newt and Fawn stepped out of the meeting house together and grinned at each other.
"How long will it take?" Newt whispered.
"Give them a few hours," Fawn told him. "Let them absorb all that information and then they will be back to normal. In the mean time, there are two little people that are dying to meet you."
A huge smile lit up Newt's face as Fawn led him over to where Grace and Brenda were playing outside with the twins. When they saw the two approaching, the girls excused themselves, leaving Fawn and Newt alone with their children.
Immediately Horace scurried over to his mother and lifted his arms, requesting to be held. Fawn happily picked him up as Navi hurried over to stare up at Newt with curiosity. The boy knelt down so that he was eye level with the girl. Navi considered the boy a moment before a big smile appeared on her chubby face and she wrapped her arms around Newt's neck.
Tears sprung to the boy's eyes as he picked the girl up, holding her close. He looked over at Horace who had been watching him constantly, summing him up. When Horace saw that Newt was looking at him, he turned and extended his arms towards Newt who happily took the boy into his arms as well, holding the twins close to him.
"No fair! He never lets anyone hold him and now he lets Newt hold him?" Gally shouted from the doorway of the meeting house.
Fawn and Newt looked at each other and just chuckled. Things were back to normal now, and the future was looking bright. They had gone through so much, gone so far and come back again from the deep depths of hell, but now they were where they had wanted to be all along.
The End
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Come Back Home - Chapter 6
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April 3, 3502 - Entry by Thomas.
Needless to say it took several weeks before we became comfortable with living possibly permanently in the glade. It has been two months since we arrived here and it has finally begun to feel like home. True to Fawn's word, we have not been bothered by Wicked and from what the Thieves have told us in their weekly reports, Wicked is being cleverly diverted to anyplace but here.
Until Wicked is destroyed and the cranks are cured or eliminated, it is best that we stay here. The first thing that we did to make the Glade feel homey was knock out giant doorways in the walls. The walls are almost 20 feet thick but with the right tools, the White Rose chiseled wide arches out, every 10 feet. Retractible doors were made for every arch which would only be closed if we were being attacked.
Gally came up with the idea to make a stairwell up to the top of the walls so that we could walk on top of them and use them as a means of protection and lookout. As there are hundreds of refugees arriving every week from abandoned buildings where they have been hiding out, we have sent groups of 100 people who have the skills, plus the equipment to begin renovating the neighboring mazes.
Each Glade is half a mile from each other and we have begun to wear trails through the low shrubbery that has grown over the expanse of san dunes that used to separate the glades. We have been sheltering under the collapsable tents that the Right Arm has provided but the Snipers have been working on using the scrap stone from the arches to make permanent housing. With the technology and tools they have from the compound, they have been putting up new houses every week.
Each house is two stories, entirely made of stone which stays cool during the hot days and warms up in the cold days if a fire is going inside. Each house can fit up to 10 people but with the speed of construction, it does not stay that packed for long and now most of the houses only house 5 people each. We didnt know how to regulate housemates until everyone began to figure it out on their own, swapping roommates so that they could house with the friends they had made when they were in the maze.
June 10, 3502 - Entry by Frypan.
Food was an issue that we knew we couldn't solve immediately. The snipers would bring carriers of food daily but we knew that once houses were going up, we had to find an alternative. Before we knew it, everyone began to fall back into the jobs that they had once occupies when they were captives of the maze. Previous Medjacks were always the first ones on the scene when someone was hurt or came down with something. The Slicers set up bigger pens and retrieved the animals that had escaped into the wild when Wicked evacuated the mazes. Everyone put their effort together to fix up the old gardens and expanded them almost ten fold.
We will not be seeing any produce from the new gardens for a few weeks yet but it is a start. We also discovered that the fruit that Wicked would send up in the box monthly actually came from huge expanses of orchards right outside the glades. Luckily they were not too malnourished and we were able to save them. They are now producing constant fruit which is what will get us through until the crops start to come in.
We also investigated the box which we found descended not into a lab of Wicked's but into a simple empty cellar under the ground. Wicked obviously made monthly trips to drop off a kid and supplies here but there was no form of security in the cellar other than a small exit which came up twenty yards outside of the walls. We closed up the exit and now use the box as a cellar to store fresh food.
August 28, 3502 - Entry by Gally.
The maze remains untouched. Living in the Glade is one thing but even ex runners refuse to step foot in the maze. The snipers cleared out the debris and any cameras or remains of Grievers and they swear that there are no grievers in there but they hold too many horrific memories. Caliber informed me the other day that the Snipers have turned Chamber 7 into a landing area for their air crafts and are now using the abandoned lab to communicate with Green Rose who are keeping close tabs on Wicked.
I presented an idea to Mace and Magnum who helped me set it up. Now if we are ever under attack, the doors of the glade will shut closing everyone inside and an invisible but impenetrable shield covers the gaping top of each glade. The only way to leave the glade are special underground tunnels that run between the ten glades and there are only two emergency exits that lead out into the dunes, 10 miles north which are constantly under watch.
September 5 3502 - Entry by Minho
I am really worried about Fawn. She is due to go into labor any day now. I know the Thorn has the best doctors on board but I still worry. Newt asked me to take care of her should anything happen to him.... what if something happens to her? I would never forgive myself. Though I must admit, Fawn proves to me every day that she barely needs protection. I swear that girl is giving me grey hairs. Just today the assassins arrived with dozens and dozens of crates in hand.
They began to lay them out and called an emergency meeting of all the glades. Soon almost a thousand people were crowded in one glade and listening to what Caliber had to say. And then he dropped the bombshell.... they had the cure! Small vials of light pink liquid were the cure and you had to inject it into your blood stream. Then there was a clear liquid, an activator which essentially kickstarts the cure. All you need to do is take a small drop of the activator and apply it directly to your skin. We have at least 50 people who are living off of weekly doses of the makeshift cure that Wicked made (the one that we stole from their vaults) and we were able to give the cure to them and within hours they were cured!
Of course after hearing Puma say that it was the same cure that Fawn gave to him years ago, I knew that I had to speak with the girl in question and rushed off to find her. Almost an hour later, I found her in the far corner of the glade where the Snipers had removed the gates of the Maze that still had the chiseled names of all the Gladers. They had been laid flat on the ground, the names facing heavenwards.
There sat Fawn, sitting crosslegged on the slab of stone.
Minho sighed as he walked over to the girl, seeing her looking at the paintings that she had scattered all over the stone. He remembered the day in the Glade when he had found her painting flowers around the names of each glader.
"You found the cure." Minho stated bluntly.
The girl looked at him, her belly now protruding immensely with her almost 9 months of pregnancy. She smiled softly. It had become a norm for her. She smiled but it wasnt the super bright, bubbly smile that she used to have but a calmer, not necessarily sad but almost tired smile but it was still a kind smile.
"Did you ever notice why I used different colors when I painted the leaves?" she asked softly.
Minho frowned, glancing at the paintings and it was almost five minutes before he realized that some of the leaves weren't green like traditional leaves.... but rather the flowers were green and the leaves were white or gold!
"Look leaves that are white," Fawn pointed.
Minho followed her finger as she pointed them out and he saw that the white leaves surrounded specific letters which were all scrambled but without much difficulty Minho was able to figure out what it spelt. SANGSTER.
"I knew Wicked would erase my memory and I would not be able to remember the important parts of the formula for the cure, so I put the formula in a specific pattern to where I could give it an abbreviation that matched with a name that I could never forget: Sangster." Fawn explained. "But there was also the fact that Wicked was the only one who had the resources to obtain the materials needed to create the cure. Now look at the golden leaves."
Minho obeyed and saw that the golden leaves encircled the names of the gladers that had been scratched out.
"When a Glader died, Wicked would move their file information into a classified folder of deceased people that no one ever accessed again. So when I was impersonating Jade Cross, I used that to my advantage and stored all of the information of where and how to obtain the materials needed for the formula under the name of the Gladers who died. Justin, Alfred, Stephen, George, all of them. I would put information under the names of the Gladers so that Wicked wouldn't realize it but the information was right under their noses. When you found me painting on the wall that one day in the glade, it wasnt because I remembered the formula, but rather I remembered the pattern that I would repeat to myself a thousand times over: SANGSTER, and the fact that Jade Cross called deceased Gladers: Golden Angels."
"But.... how did you manage to get all the materials and make the cure?! You have been here for the past several months!" Minho pointed out, "Do you have a double? A doppelgänger?"
Fawn chuckled, "No, I have two Thieves in the Wicked Compound now, masquerading as surgeons. They have been making constantly orders for the materials needed without Wicked knowing. They have been putting the cure and the activator together under the guise of making a new prophylactic treatment, but they have been sending it to us via the Snipers."
******
"Minho!" Gally complained. "you know it is my turn to hold her!"
Minho eyed Gally. So much had changed in the last eighteen months that they had been living in the Glade. Sometimes when Minho looked around, even at his now boyfriend Gally he couldn't believe how things had changed. The weather was not only less scorching and more agreeable, but the people in their lives had changed as well.
Minho had grown out his hair so that he now had to brush it back and tie it with a ponytail at the back of his head but there was always a strand of hair that got away from him and it would irk him through the day. It rather suited him ever since he had been given the job of "negotiator" which involved him being called to settle arguments amongst the people.
Though, no one ever called him that. They just called him by his name, or Cap. Gally's hair had also grown out but he kept it two inches long which was more manageable than Minho's since Gally spent all his time running defenses.
Minho looked down at the little dirty blond haired girl in his lap. She was almost a year old now and walking confidently on her own, though she did like it when her uncle Minho held her so that she could help him pick the apples in the orchard.
"Navi," Minho whispered to the girl, "Do you want Uncle Gally to hold you?"
The girl locked her bright blue eyes on Minho then on Gally before she latched her little arms tightly around Minho's neck. Gally huffed in defeat at the smug look on Minho's face while Minho restrained a laugh.
"You know you could always ask Fawn to let you play with Horace," Minho observed.
Gally gave him a skeptical look. "You know just as well as I do that Horace refuses to be held by anyone but Fawn. It took Drake five months to get close to the kid! Though that dog does have much better babysitting skills than I do."
At that moment, the two boys looked down the row of trees to where Fawn stood with her son on her hip. Horace and Navi had been born two weeks earlier than expected but they were healthy and beautiful. Navi took her features from Fawn, her lips, eyes, personality and curls but she had her father's blond hair. Horace however had Fawn's bright red hair but Newt's deep brown eyes, goofy smile and calm personality.
Fawn's hair had grown out, almost past her hips which seemed to suit her for Fawn had put the badass, assassin side of her behind when the twins were born. Now she spends all her time with her kids and regulating cure production, even naming the cure: Sting. No one knew why she named it that but they didnt quarrel with her. Ever since the cure had been made, there were less and less crank appearances every week. Caliber suspected that in another two years there wouldn't be a point to even make the cure because by then everyone would have had to inject the cure for some reason or another, either exposure, bite, injury, or directly from the sun (which was unlikely given the lack of scorching heat). However, they had the supply of Sting to last them decades at this point.
"Fawn!" Brenda's voice shouted through the orchard and she could be seen sprinting towards them with Thomas on her heels. "Auberon has news! Hurry!"
Usually when Auberon had news it wasnt bad nor good enough to require such an urgent summoning, so the three teens hurried back into the Glade. In the center of the Glade where they had loan a huge slab of stone used for meetings, Auberon and the Snipers had gathered.
Fawn handed Horace off to Gally who instantly took the boy. Horace was not exactly pleased with the separation from his mother but he was too relaxed right now to put up a fight other than avoid eye contact with Gally.
"What is it Auberon?" Fawn asked.
The Sniper beamed, placing a hologram transmitter on the table before pressing play. It was a recording of the daily news that is broadcasted throughout the cities and towns in the more high class parts of the world, much too far for any of the Gladers to get ahold of but Auberon had his ways. Footage of a building crumbling from an explosion flashed on as a voiceover spoke.
"In the news today, the three remaining Wicked Facilities were all destroyed earlier this afternoon. No one can find out how the buildings collapsed as not even a bomb could cause this level of decimation in just a few hours. Even the bodies of the victims were unable to be located in the mass of ash which is all that is left of Wicked at this point. Scientists were called to the scene and they suspect that it must have been a very carefully planned out attack with next generation level of weaponry or it had to have been an explosion of certain chemicals that was equivalent to being exposed directly to the sun's surface."
Auberon switched off the hologram and silence enveloped the crowd of people who had gathered to listen.
"Wicked..... is finally gone?" Thomas whispered.
Fawn turned to him, the first truly genuine smile appearing on her face for the first time in over a year. "Yes Thomas. They are officially gone."
The silence didnt last long, what with people screaming, cheering and crying for joy as they all rushed around like madmen, trying to hug everyone within arm's reach. It wasnt until Fawn was giving a very happy Frypan a hug that Grace's voice split the air.
"Fawn!? You might want to see this."
Everyone quieted down, detecting the confusion and seemingly commanding tone in the deaf girl's voice. The whole congregation of several hundred people turned all at once to see that the noiseless Assassin ship had landed right outside the front archway of the Glade and the assassins each tumbled out, huge grins on their faces.... except, there were two extra heads than usual.
The taller of the two was dressed in jeans, black shirt and a long black trench coat which was confusing but considering that the Assassins were also dressed in coats, wherever they had flown from had been cold. The tall stranger had a cloth tied around his face, hiding everything from his nose down.
The shorter of the two wore a navy hoodie, brown cargo pants and hiker boots. It was hard to recognize them, what with the tall guy wearing a mask and the shorter with his hood up, but as they and the assassins approached, walking through the archway, the shorter stranger pushed his hood back, revealing a head full of almost chin length brownish hair.
A girlish squeak split the silence, having come from Thomas, as his shrilly shouted.
"NEWT!?"
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
Text
Come Back Home - Chapter 5
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"Fawn...." Minho croaked, trying to talk around the lump in his throat that was building as the tears in his eyes stung. "We need to get out of here. With these explosions, buildings are going to start falling."
Fawn didnt brush off Minho's gentle hand but she didnt oblige him either, stroking the damp hair out of Newt's still face, bending down to plant a shaky kiss to his forehead. Brenda crouched down next to the girl and wrapped her arms around the girl securely.
"He is at peace now. He cannot feel the pain. Look, the tension and the misery has left his face now."
Fawn sniffled as her trembling fingers traced the boy's jaw. She allowed Brenda to draw her to a standing position, wiping her tears and straightening her shoulders.
"Where is Thomas?" she asked, voice stiff.
"He ran off back towards the building. Said something about finding the truth," Minho responded, his strong body shielding the two girls from the debris that began to pollute the air.
"It better fucking be Teresa he's going after," Fawn growled. "Because I have something to tell her as well."
Minho and Brenda exchanged looks, terrified by the harshness in the usually happy girl's voice. the two began to gently guid her back to where the helicopter was waiting, not wanting the girl to continue to see Newt's dead limp body.
As they approached the waiting ship, Minho and Brenda helped the shaking Fawn into the carrier, Gally reaching for her hand to help. As the girl sat down, Drake rushed over and began whining happily and barking at the girl but she didnt move. She didnt even look down as she sat like a stone statue in her seat.
Gally looked over at Minho, about to ask what was wrong with her when he noticed the absence of two of their numbers.
"Where are Thomas and Newt?" he asked, his voice causing Caliber to poke his head from the cockpit.
"Thomas went after Teresa." Minho replied as he sat down next to Fawn.
"And Newt?" Gally asked.
He was met with silence and he began to shake his head as if trying to shake the idea of Newt dead from his mind until he saw Brenda return the cure vial to Caliber.... still full.
"Fawn?" Caliber whispered, gently taking his sister's hands, "Are you okay?"
"Find her," Fawn growled. "Find Teresa..... now!"
Minho and Gally could hear everyone jump in their seats at Fawn's shout and Caliber did not waste time in getting back into the cockpit. It didnt take long to track Thomas down and find him on top of the tallest building in the city. It was clear that the building was going to crumble any second now and there stood Thomas, hands in the air, something obviously wrong with his leg because he was limping and there with him with a gun pointed to his head.... was Teresa
"Open the hatch," Fawn said as she got to her feet and walked to the end of the hatch with Brenda, Gally and Minho.
A smirk appeared on Teresa's face when she recognized the bright red hair billowing in the wind. "I knew you would track him." she sneered. "No point in killing the bait and possible blood supply when there is a bigger fish to catch."
"Taking Thomas's blood isnt going to cure anyone," Brenda shouted. "You cannot cure purely from blood! When I was given his blood, the doctor also gave me something else. By itself, his blood is useless!"
Teresa cackled. "Which is why I need Fawn. you stole the archives that Dr. Cross worked so diligently to create that had the cure's formula. And I want it back."
"Do you think that we're stupid!?" Minho shouted. "When you were torturing me, you said that you only want the cure to keep Wicked alive. You have no intention of saving anyone."
Teresa shrugged, "So? I dont see how you have the upper hand what with my gun to Thomas's head. I dont mind killing him if it means that I get Fawn and the archives."
Gally was going to start shouting profanities at the girl when Fawn tossed a small silver hard drive to the girl who dropped her gun to catch it. She quickly pushed the drive into the thick bracelet on her wrist and a hologram appeared from the bracelet..... which read: BLANK.
"Hey!" The girl screeched. "This is empty!"
Fawn laughed. "You dont say? let me ask you something Teresa. Did anyone actually see the archives or actually see the cure in action? Its because Jade Cross never wrote the cure down! Did you really think I was stupid enough to find the cure and write it down for you to use and destroy? Fat chance!"
Teresa lifted a shaking finger, everyone else but Gally also gawking at Fawn.
"I made up the idea of the archives and the story that I stole them to stage Dr. Cross's death which gave Wicked a reason to kidnap me and thrown me into the maze. How else could I have ensured my ending up in the same maze as Newt? I knew Wicked wouldn't risk putting me in a maze with girls out of fear that one of them would be the friends that I was avenging. They never thought that they would be boys."
"Why you!" Teresa screeched, reaching for her gun again but by then, Thomas had been dragged onto the ship by Minho and Brenda and a hissing sound broke the silence.
Brenda and Thomas stared in horror, faces white in shock as Fawn's arrow hurried itself in Teresa's forehead, the girl dropping on the spot as the building began to crumble.
"I was going to make it a slow death," Fawn muttered to no one in particular. "But I got tired of hearing her voice."
"Remind me to never piss her off," Minho whispered to Thomas as the hatch slid shut and they flew off.
"Fawn.... what you said back there.... is there really a cure?"
A sad smile barely made its way onto her face. "Of course there is. I am just the only one who knows where it is. But first, lets get everyone to safety."
******
The door of the bedroom slid open quietly as Thomas poked his head inside to see Minho sitting silently next Fawn who was sound asleep, Drake curled up protectively at her feet.
"how is she doing?" Thomas asked, closing the door behind him.
Minho sighed as he closed the book he had been reading, "She sleeps for two hours, then wakes up to go puke and then attempt to eat, then she repeats."
Thomas nodded, "Pisces checked on her last night and said that is the morning sickness."
Minho hummed "But the silence isnt. Its been two weeks Thomas and she still hasn't said a word."
The hope that Thomas had built up, thinking that maybe Fawn was doing better went down the drain. Two weeks since they had escaped Wicked and were hiding out at the Thorn compound in the mountains. Two weeks since 200 refugees moved in, waiting to hear any news from the Snipers who were keeping tabs on Wicked. Two weeks since Newt's death.... and two weeks since Fawn had spoken.
Thomas sunk into the chair on the other side of the bed, opposite Minho.
"I never thought I would see that side of Fawn. She was always so happy, cheeky and yes sarcastic at times but...when she realized that Newt was gone...."
"The assassin in her came to the surface. "Minho finished for him. "I spoke with Grace and Caliber about this. They likened her to a hunting dog. she is fun and playful on the average day but if someone targets a person she cares about, she instantly goes into fight rather than flight mode."
"Did they mention her also going mute?" Thomas asked.
Minho shook his head. "Thomas, Brenda hasn't known Newt nearly as long as we have but she has been sobbing for days. Frypan will not leave his room and Gally has broken five punching bags today. I haven't slept since Newt's death, plagued with the nightmares of his death. Not nightmares of my being tortured by Wicked, but by Newt's death because the torture is nothing compared to what I am feeling after Newt's death. If you were dating someone and that person abruptly died before your eyes, leaving you a single parent, would you react similarly to how Fawn has?"
Thomas's shoulders slumped. "You're right."
Minho reached into his pocket and pulled out a chain, on the end was a small pendant that looked like a miniature thermos.
"Newt told me to give this to you."
Thomas slowly took the pendent in his hands and after staring at it for a while, he opened it, revealing a small sheet of paper that had been rolled up tightly inside. Unfolding it carefully he was faced by neat, elegant handwriting and he knew that it was Newt's. He had just finished reading it, tears pricking at his eyes when the door banged open loudly, Auberon panting in the doorway.
The loud noise had jolted Fawn awake who was now sitting upright in bed, Drake bouncing from the bed in surprise at having been accidentally kicked by Fawn.
"Wicked has moved to their compound 25 leagues to the west. based on intel from Thieves, the lost city is the farthest Wicked is willing to go as of now. They wont go beyond the Lost City unless it is dire."
"For what reasons?" Minho asked.
"They are weakened right now and they fear the Right Arm, Thorn, as well as the alliance our two forces have together. Plus the Lost City is overtaken by cranks. They are hauling away what they can in carriers and leaving the rest to rot."
"So everything to the east of the Lost City is safe territory from Wicked?" Fawn asked, her voice soft and yet it still made the three boys jump clear out of their skin.
"W...w...w...wha..... y...y....yeah..." Auberon stuttered. "Why?"
Fawn of course didnt answer his question but reached to her nightstand and retrieved the mobile she used to communicate with the Thorn members.
"Caliber?" She asked when the boy in question decided to pick up. "Tell everyone that we move out in two days time."
The girl hung up shortly only to find Minho and Thomas staring at her in confusion.
"We're moving out? To where?"
Fawn looked at Auberon, "You know where. Scout out the area today and tomorrow before anyone arrives. Were going somewhere safe where Wicked would never find us."
********
Thomas kept poking his head against the window, cheek rubbing against the glass as he tried to see where they were but the carrier was well above the clouds, away from the prying eyes of any possible Wicked satellites.
"Please remain in your seats everyone. We are about to begin descent," Gemini spoke calmly over the intercom of the carrier.
Thomas buckled himself down between Fawn and Gally as they felt the carrier slowly descend. They couldn't even hear the dozens of other aircrafts nearby that were also descending, carrying all the Wicked refugees. Finally the felt the ship make contact with the ground and when the engines had powered off, everyone began to pool out of the carriers like ants, only to stop short when they saw just where they were.
Thomas, Gally, Minho and Frypan turned to look at Fawn in confused shock. "Spitfire, why are we here?" Gally asked first.
"Have you ever heard the saying, 'right under their nose'?" Fawn asked, stroking Drake's fluffy ears as the dog nudged her hand. "Well this place is 50 leagues too Far East for Wicked to venture and it is also protected by the Thorn compounds that line the mountains between us and Wicked. And it is also the last place Wicked would think to look for us which makes it the safest place. With some renovations it will be the ideal place to live and be protected."
Caliber plopped his arm around his sister's shoulders to show the boys that he was in support of Fawn's plan.
"Besides, it's 10 neighboring siblings are all within 10 miles and equally abandoned which means that there is plenty of room for everyone. And all those threats have been eliminated and the connections this place used to have with Wicked has been severed when they left the Lost City. White Rose has also put up an electromagnetic barrier in a 50 mile diameter so if anyone froM Wicked crosses too close, we will know it."
"FML," Frypan whispered. "This is whacky."
The four boys, the last of the glade other than Fawn, looked around at their all too familiar surrounding as they realized that they were once again in the Glade!
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
Text
Come Back Home - Chapter 4
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The sound of the vault clicking open was drowned out by the sound of the door practically falling off the hinges and Thomas and Newt blew their way in, followed closely by 20-30 kids.
"Good, you guys got in," Thomas panted. "How my I ask?"
"Long story," Gally responded. "Minho? Where is Teresa?"
"Teresa ditched us the moment Jenson appeared. Minho wants in the normal holding cells." Newt replied.
"he is probably in the lab," Fawn stated as she placed a small bottle of some white liquid in her pocket before anyone could see. "You two go get him. We will get the serum and these kids out."
"Shouldnt you stay here to get the cure as soon as possible?" Thomas asked Newt.
"Minho is the priority right now." Newt replied before nodding discreetly at Fawn.
Fawn walked over to Newt and planted a kiss on his cheek before she smiled at him. "Hurry."
The two boys hurried back out the way they had come and when Gally was preoccupied drilling through the vault door, Fawn pressed a button her watch which started a fifteen minute timer.
It was not long before Gally finished drilling through the vault and he poked his head inside before pulling out a rack of blue vials which he placed in his backpack. His eyes scanned the room of frightened kids before he hands the bag to the oldest looking boy.
"Protect this with your life." He whispered. "Okay, let's get you out of here.:
The two teens knew that Brenda and Grace were waiting for them in the garage in the bus that the two had hacked and stolen.
Luckily the garage was just next door and before long they had trooped all the kids inside the bus just as an alarm began blaring..
"What's going on?" One of the kids asked, shaking from head to toe.
"They alerted security to my presence I am guessing," Fawn said. "And the other? It would appear that a high class prisoner broke out of the lab."
Gally's face lit up at this news. "Minho! Brenda, get them to the crane so that Frypan can get you guys out. We're going to find the others."
Gally grabbed Fawn by the hand so they wouldn't get separated and they rushed out into the cold, dark outside. Fawn pulled out her tracker, quickly finding where Newt and Thomas were.
"It says that they are right here...." Fawn said, looking around the empty courtyard. "I'm not seeing them..."
She felt Gally grab her by the shoulders and push her towards the dark low wall nearby, "hide," he hissed.
Without asking the girl obeyed and ducked behind the low wall. Poking her head out, she saw three strangely familiar faces pop out of the pool that was in the center of the courtyard. Minho, Newt and Thomas!
But as soon as they climbed out, a handful of guards surrounded them, guns raised. Fawn looked to her left, expecting to find Gally there but he was MIA. She immediately looked back at the guards and recognized his bulky build among the guards.
The girl didnt even have to draw out her bow before Gally had shot down the other guards, eliminating the threat and he removed his helmet.
"Gally!?" Minho practically shouted. "You're alive!"
"I should definitely hope so," Gally said as Fawn walked over to them, hitting Gally on the back of the leg. "ouch! That hurt!"
"Don't scare me like that!" The girl scolded before she rushed over to Minho and brought him into a tight hug.
"Hugs later, run now?" Thomas interrupted. "Newt is coughing up a lung here and we need to get him to the cure."
A huge explosion nearby made the tens jump as they saw red fire light up the darkened streets, a couple blocks down.
"Gally?" Fawn whispered. "What is that?"
"Lawrence must have lost his patience."
"Shit!" The others cursed as another explosion met their ears.
"Where is Brenda? She has the cure right?" Newt asked weakly, leaning heavily on Fawn.
"I'll find her,"G ally said as he turned on his radio.
"Why didnt you guys just bring one of the vials with you?" Thomas snapped.
"Hey!" Newt hissed back, "Its okay. They were busy doing other things."
The sound of shouts and gunfire met their ears as another explosion went off a little too close to them.
"Hurry! We need to get out of here!" Thomas screeched, leading Minho and Fawn who were supporting Newt to the next block and behind a wall.
"Brenda do you copy?" Gally screamed into the radio.
"Ye....wh.....you...." her voice came in choppy over the radio, the signal probably being destroyed by the explosions.
"WE're on 5th and south!" Gally shouted back. "Where are you?"
"Crane....out..... hanger...."
"HUH!?" the boys all wind together just as Fawn's tracker blinked and a message appeared on the screen.
"Caliber has a ship in the air. He is going to pick Brenda up and bring her to the landing pad on 8th."
"That's too far!" Thomas objected. "Newt can barely walk as it is!"
At that moment, Newt retched violently but the noise was drowned out by the gunfire, black dripping from his mouth.
"Minho," Newt whispered hoarsely, "You and Gally run to meet.... Brenda. We will follow you guys."
"Newt," Minho sighed, not liking the idea of leaving him.
"I will slow him down!" Gally pointed out.
"Someone needs to protect him," Newt gagged. "Thomas and Fawn will help me and we will meet you guys halfway."
Minho knelt down in front of Newt who grabbed the boy's hand shakily but surprisingly violently and placed something in Minho's hand before the boy and Gally took off at a dead sprint.
"Okay pal," Thomas said as he and Fawn tried to gently get him to his feet. "Lets get started shall we?"
Newt hissed and groaned loudly in pain as he stumbled along, leaning against the two for support. As they hobbled along, ducking out of sight to avoid the gunfire, Fawn reached to her tracker and hastily punched in a quick message.
'Do it.'
*******
When Minho had reached Brenda, the girl didnt even stop to give him the cure but began sprinting back with him, shouting over her shoulder at the panting Gally.
"We've got this! Get the kids out of here!"
Gally didnt even bother to object as he doubled over to try and catch his break as he leant against his knees.
Meanwhile Brenda had been just about to round a corner when something slammed into her, making her trip but luckily she caught herself. Minho had instantly drawn his hand gun that Gally had given him only to stop when he saw what or rather who Brenda had stumbled over.
"Drake!?"
The dog's ears perked up and he sprinted to Minho, jumping up to lick his face, his large tail wagging in joy at finding someone he recognized.
"How.... who..... How are you still alive!?"
The dog just kept barking, tail still wagging.
"This is Fawn's dog that went missing right?" Brenda asked as she got to her feet.
Minho nodded, "Yeah, we thought that the crank got him but he must have escaped!"
The boy noted that the thick collar that the dog previously wore was replaced by a thin black one.
He didnt have time to think on that because someone yanked him up by the shirt, another person doing the same to Brenda, a third grabbing Drake's collar and holding him at arms length as the dog squirmed and snapped. Minho recognized the black garb of the Wicked guards instantly and he mentally cursed. They were losing time!
"What do we have here?" the one holding Minho said, his voice sounding like he was trying to make it deeper. "This is the kid who escaped. Lets get him to Janson."
The handful of guards began dragging the two teens and Drake back the way they had come when suddenly one of the guards instantly fell, a gunshot ringing in the air. Brenda and Minho turned and Brenda immediately recognized Auberon and the other snipers .
"Go!" Feline yelled as he shot at another guard. "We've got this!"
Brenda snatched the confused Minho's hand and the two sprinted off, not looking back to see how the Snipers were fairing against the guards. The two teens had barely rounded the corner and disappeared from sight when the guards and the snipers lowered their guns and Lynx hurried to the guard who had been shot.
"Did I hit you!? I'm sorry!"
The guard in question removed his helmet to reveal a head full of bright orange hair.
"No, dont worry about it. The vest did its job."
Lynx helped the redhead to his feet. "Do you think that was enough time?"
Almost two seconds later, like magic, Auberon's watch beeped and he checked it. "It was plenty of time. Every second counts."
********
"Come on buddy," Thomas encouraged Newt, "Just a little further."
The boy in question stumbled, his face dripping sweat and his veins bulging and black. Fawn lifted her head and she could see the corner of 6th just ahead. Minho and Gally were probably just around the corner. However the next thing she knew, she and the two boys were flying in all directions, a huge explosion going off to their left, making Fawn roll away from where Thomas and Newt had landed.
She could barely hear the groans of the two boys over the sound of the explosion. Her first instinct was to feel her abdomen. Luckily a frustrated little kick in her groin told her that the baby was fine but her legs were throbbing from taking the lion's share of the fall.
"Newt?" Thomas's choked voice made her look up.
About 20 feet from her stood Thomas, hands extended in surrender while Newt was stone still, face barely recognizable with how the infection was taking over, his teeth clenched and black drool seeping from his mouth.
"Hey Newt.... buddy...." Thomas said, his face ashen white when he heard the snarl that left Newt's lips.
"You okay pal?"
The response he got was the sick boy charging at him with a croaky, guttural growl that instantly reminded him of the cranks back int he mall. Thomas screeched as he dodged the blind attack, trying to not hurt his friend but also not get slashed or bitten by the boy. Fawn stumbled to her feet but just as she took a step forward to help, Thomas shouted.
"No! Stay there!"
The girl knew that this was the worst time to try and argue with Thomas so she drew her bow, making sure that the two boys weren't shot by the guards or Lawrence's men.
"Gally and Minho are on their way!" She shouted as Thomas held Newt back at arms length which was almost not far away enough. Finally the boy had no choice and hit Newt in the face which dazed New temporarily. That was when they saw it... a long black blade in his hand which was now becoming drenched in his black secretions.
"Thomas!?" Fawn shouted, recognizing the knife.
Thomas checked his belt and sure enough, the knife that Caliber had given him was gone!
Fawn dropped her bow, quickly seeing from her tracker just how far Minho was. He was only a quarter mile away and moving fast. Thomas needed to keep Newt busy just a little longer. The growling and grunting stopped abruptly and it made Fawn lift her eyes up to see Newt slowly stumble back from a sheet white Thomas.... the knife hurried deep in his abdomen.
"NEWT!" a blood curdling scream ripped from Fawn's mouth as the boy crumbled to the ground.
She sprinted to his side, her sore legs long forgotten, her body trembling and heart plummeting. Too distraught to see Minho and Brenda arrive.... just too late.
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
Text
Come Back Home - Chapter 3
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Fawn sat calmly in a chair surrounded by the snipers as Gally and Newt interrogated Teresa. Thomas was avoiding joining in the interrogation because he as well as everyone else knew that he still couldn't accept the fact that Teresa was a psychopathic traitor.....or at least that is what Gally called her and Fawn sometimes was apt to agree with him. When Teresa had woken up to her blindfold and gag removed, her eyes at once located Fawn, which was why the Snipers had wasted no time in surrounding the girl, not just to protect Fawn but also told down the red head in question should she feel the urge to murder Teresa.
"This isnt working," Newt said to the others, "if we want to access through the doors we will need to take her with us because she is the only one among us with fingerprint access."
"Not necessarily, we dont really need her," Gally observed. "We just need her finger."
Fawn stifled an amused chuckle when Gally picked up a small surgical knife.
"easy there big guy," Magnum said, placing a hand on Gally's shoulder.
"Diversion," Fawn said, immediately gaining everyone's attention. "Newt and Thomas go with Teresa to get Minho out and Gally comes with me."
"You can't do that!" Teresa objected, making Fawn roll her eyes, "The trackers in your necks will go off the moment you are within a mile of the city."
"Yeah yeah," Thomas sighed, "We know Wicked put trackers in our necks. That is what you are going to help us with. you have the counter code to prevent the trackers from blowing up so you are going to remove them for us. Gally and Fawn both dont have trackers so they dont need your assistance."
"But if they dont have fingerprint access they cannot get in without me! Besides what are they going to be doing if you and Newt are getting Minho?"
"I do not see how that is any of your concern," Brenda spoke up, venom dripping from her voice. 'YOu worry about getting them to Minho and if you betray them even slightly, your finger isnt going to be what you need to worry about losing."
Teresa rolled her eyes, "Fine. I need a knife and tweezers."
Gally untied her but stood right over her as she began to work on the trackers in Frypan, Newt and Thomas's necks.
"Brenda has recovered nicely I see," Teresa observed, trying to make small talk but Thomas tensed. "If you let me take a look at her I can see if she needs another dose soon."
"Don't even think about going near her," Thomas growled, shocking Gally who wasnt expecting that kind of reaction from Thomas. "Besides she is fully cured."
Teresa paused as she removed the tracker from Thomas's neck, "That's impossible. She would have had to be on the cure for the rest of her life."
"We told you already, we know what the cure is." Gally hissed, knowing full well that only Fawn knew the cure but she only knew in her memory before the maze which she was still lacking.
"Thomas there is no way one treatment could have cured her...." Teresa began but Thomas got to his feet.
"Shut up. You worry about helping us rescue Minho and then Gally is free to do whatever he wants to you."
As Newt and Frypan tied Teresa back up, Gally frowned to himself. What Teresa said did make him wonder. How did one treatment cure Brenda while Lawrence had to live off constant treatment? Not only that but when Puma said that Fawn had cured him.... if Fawn had leaked the cure information to Wicked because only they had the capacity to create the cure, how come Fawn managed to get her hands on the cure?
*******
"Thank you for helping me with this," Fawn said as Gemini handed her a paper bag, inside contained a rubber mask.
The humanoid smiled and nodded before holding out another bag which contained Wicked attire. Fawn slipped into a nearby room to change and when she emerged, Newt and Gally both jumped. Not only was she dressed like a Wicked surgeon but her face was also different with long blond hair, blue eyes and sharp features.
"Don't scare me like that!" Gally whined. "How come I didnt know these masks existed?"
"Miss Fawn didnt invent the transformer masks until one year before she entered the maze," Gemini told the boys.
"You just have all kinds of tricks up your sleeve dont you?" Newt smiled.
"Here," Fawn said, handing the two boys matching guard attire.
"One question though," Gally asked, "How are the two of us going to get in if Teresa is with Newt and Thomas?"
"I purposely didnt tell you guys earlier because if Teresa finds out, she could set off an alarm," Fawn whispered. "Teresa cannot use her card. She must use her fingerprint to open two separate doors. If she uses her thumbprint twice in the span of five ours , the system pauses for five seconds, long enough for me to hack the doors and get in before the system reboots. If she uses her thumbprint only once, it wont work so you have to convincer her. There are three separate doors you guys will pass through so you have limited chances."
"how could she set off an alarm?" Newt asked.
"She is already suspicious of where Gally and I will be. We will be trying to get into the holding cell where they hold the cure. If she knows what we are up to she can set off an alarm by using her pointer finger rather than her thumb which sets off an automatic code red."
"Sheesh. Wicked is seriously paranoid," Gally whistled. "So Newt and Thomas will try to get her to use her thumb twice. What happens if he fails?"
"I have a backup plan but I want to avoid using it if I can help it."
The two boys nodded, knowing that whatever it was, Fawn knew what she was doing.
"Miss Fawn," Gemini spoke, "Here is the mobile. It will give you access to all the security cameras."
Gally and Newt's eyes bulged at this advanced technology.
"It will shut off immediately after you have entered the holding chamber so that Wicked cannot track its signal or shut off access."
Fawn smiled as she pocketed the device. "Wicked may be paranoid but they like their holograms a little too much and they dont realize that holograms are the easiest thing to hack."
*******
"This is absolutely going to fail." Gally whispered as he and Fawn stood in the silent hallway, waiting for Teresa to give them access.
They had managed to bypass the doors that led from the garage into the hallway directly below the vault but if they wanted to continue into the vault room they needed fingerprint access to go further.
Fawn smiled at her best friend as she watched Teresa, Newt and Thomas on the security mobile.
"Okay they are approaching the first door now." She whispered, Gally rushing over to her side to watch as well.
They watched as Teresa reached into her pocket for her key card but Thomas purposely grabbed her arm, holding it as if in warning. they seemed to exchange a few words until finally Teresa used her left thumb to open the door.
"One down. they need to be careful because if they alert Teresa or if the security suspects that she is a hostage, we will be in deep shit."
The two watched as the three approached the next door. Right at that moment, a light began to blink on the mobile.
"Crap, someone is coming," Fawn whispered.
Gally hurried to the door on the opposite end of the hall and poked his head through the window. "I dont see anyone yet. We need to hurry this up."
"She used the key card," Fawn growled. "She is getting suspicious. We have one more chance."
"I see someone coming!" Gally whisper yelled back.
Fawn watched as Newt and Thomas tried to secretly get Teresa to use her thumbprint.
"Fawn!?" Gally hissed in her ear. "We need to go now!"
Fawn hastily snatched up her com link, "Newt, abort. Let her use the card."
Gally and Fawn saw through the mobile that Newt and Thomas immediately stepped back and Teresa used her keycard.
"Now what?" Gally whispered.
"Act natural." Fawn whispered as she tucked the mobile away and began punching in numbers on the touch screen before it suddenly asked her for her fingerprint.
Gally was muttering something about how acting natural was the least of their concerns in this day and age. At that moment the door behind them opened as the person entered and the door in front of them opened simultaneously.
Fawn and Gally stepped through the door and it shut behind them. Gally rushed to check and see where the person had gone to see that the person had disappeared down another side room in the hallway.
"How did you open it?" he whispered.
Fawn merely smiled and walked over to one of the vaults. "You're only allowed to open one vault at a time so you might want to start drilling the others. I'll get this one."
Gally drew out his tools when a computer voice spoke.
"Welcome Jade Cross."
"Who is Jade Cross?" Gally asked as he saw an ID photo appear on the touchscreen, "And how come she looks like the disguise you are wearing?"
"How do you suppose I stole the archives back from Wicked? I infiltrated Wicked as a scientist."
"So you worked for Wicked under the alias of Jade Cross.... anything else I should know?"
Fawn shrugged, "I was known as the genius scientist who was set the task of investigating the "leaked information" they were given and I was the one who discovered how to make a cure out of it but when Wicked canceled the operation they sent me to the security lab.... oh and we only have ten minutes before we are found out."
"Ten? How come?" Gally asked.
"Because when security notices that Jade Cross used thumbprint access, it will take ten minutes for them to send this warning to security and for guards to get down here."
"But I thought you said Jade Cross worked for Wicked. Why would they send an alert to security?"
"Well..... Jade Cross may be on their records as deceased because I might have faked my death.... they are under the impression that the Avenging Angel killed Jade Cross."
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
Text
Come Back Home - Chapter 2
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"No, you are not coming," Newt retorted as he and Fawn negotiated her coming along.
Fawn snorted. "So how come you get to go along when you are the one out of the two of us who is dying?"
Newt gave her no reply and that enticed Fawn to grab his non infected arm to pull him to a stop and turn him around to look at her. "Or did you not tell Thomas?"
"Not yet," Newt replied. "I was able to get away with not having to tell him because he took my blowout as just being pissed that our plan failed."
"Oh so you get to keep your injury a secret but just because everyone happens to know I'm sprouting a mini you, I have to sit out?"
Newt smiled, having gotten used to Fawn's sarcasm that had been practically dripping recently what with her getting further along in her pregnancy.
"I would let you watch us from the air in the ships with Caliber but you know that we are going to be getting really close to the city and we cannot risk WICKED picking up the signal from the ships." Newt pointed out, trying to ease the conversation.
"I think I might have solved that," Mace's voice said as the tall boy came trotting down the hallway with Magnum on his heels. "I bypassed the radiation parameter in one of the ships so that it will not connect with the Wicked signals and we will remain undetected."
"But there is the issue that Wicked will see your ship," Newt observed.
Magnum grinned as he looped his arm around his tall brother's shoulders. "You underestimate us Newt. Fawn was actually the one who came up with the prototype for the vanishing cameras. We can hover undetected and no one will be able to see us thanks to reflective mirrors and cameras on the exterior of the ship."
Newt glanced at his girlfriend to see Fawn grinning mischievously at him. There was no way she was going to miss out on going along and he knew it. He sighed, running his fingers through his hair.
"Fine! You can come along but you must stay in the ship at all times and if any guns start firing, you will be traveling back here post haste," he said, wagging his finger in warning. "Thomas, Frypan and I will be on the ground in the jeep since we can hide in the crowd better than a giant ship can."
Fawn grinned from ear to ear as she looped her arms around his waist and chuckled up at him, "Thank you babes."
"Stop that," Newt whisper hissed at her, glancing at Mace and Magnum who pretended to not notice their PDA.
It was at that moment that Caliber poked his head through one of the doors and Newt and Fawn hastily put some distance between themselves as Caliber had shown the usual brotherly reaction to their PDA in the past.
"Ready you guys? Jorge and Brenda insist on following along in the ship just in case you guys need any help."
Newt nodded, "Yeah we're coming."
The four followed the lead assassin into the main garage where the jeep was parked with Thomas and Frypan ready to go.
"You didn't happen to tell Vince that we are doing this did you?" Thomas asked. "If he finds out we're doing this he will literally kill us himself."
"Vince can let it rest," Fawn responded. "the whole train rescue mission failed for us while he managed to get Sonya back. He got his person back, that's all he cares about now it is our turn to get our person back so let's crack on."
The gang grinned at her sarcasm and promptly piled into the jeep while Caliber, Mace, Arrow, Trigger and Saber climbed into the small Sniper ship that was under the control of Serval, Lynx and Auberon. The rest of the Snipers and Assassins were remaining at the compound and would be following a little while later once the gang managed to find a hiding place closer to the Lost City, leaving the compound in the reliable hands of the White Rose.
Fawn climbed into the ship after her brother with Jorge and Brenda on her tail and she promptly buckled herself in as they silently took to the skies. She knew it would be a couple of hours before they managed to get close to the city (as they had to travel very slowly once they were within 2 miles of the city so as to not be detected since the mirrors and cameras had to do their work). Because of this she leant back against the seat and decided to take a cat nap.
When Fawn woke, she found it was because Lynx was gently shaking her awake. She hastily looked around, taking in her surroundings to see that Jorge and Brenda were absent.
"We landed an hour ago," Lynx whispered, knowing what the girl was thinking. "They joined the others on the ground since there are a lot of cranks nearby. We are approaching the city now.... it doesnt look too good."
Fawn unbuckled herself and headed to the side window where Serval stood to peer down at what they were looking at. Sure enough, the large Lost City rose up out of the desolate desert and the old half abandoned, crank riddled towns surrounding it. A huge crowd of hundreds of people were on the outside of the thrown together gates that was the only thing keeping the cranks out and Wicked in. The protesters obviously wanted to be let in, too afraid to return to the towns that were just a little too close to crank territory.
"There they are," Serval whispered, showing Fawn a small tracker he had in his hand which showed exactly where the gang were down amongst the crowd. "Let's just hope they dont get too close to the gates otherwise their trackers will activate."
Fawn nodded as she watched the little red dots on the tracker beep, showing every time one of the boys moved. It was at that moment she saw that one of the red dots got a little too close to the gates and instantly Auberon spoke from the cockpit.
"Get into your seats guys. We're gonna have to land nearby. Wicked just picked up their tracking devices. We're gonna have to split."
Fawn bolted back to her seat and buckled up between Serval and Lynx. Auberon had barely begun moving the ship when the sound of guns firing reached their ears and Fawn closed her eyes. She really hoped that the boys got out of that hell fire otherwise she was going to find their bodies and kill them herself.
**********
It wasn't long before Auberon landed the ship in a nearby town, close to where the trackers had stated they would find the boys and Fawn leapt out of the ship. He had landed inside an old abandoned garage of some sort but there was no sign of the boys or the jeep anywhere.
She turned to Serval who was slowly turning around to find out where the signal was strongest until he paused, pointing the tracker across the street at another abandoned building. Fawn scurried across the street with the others close on her tail just in time to see two huge black vans parked there with at least two dozen men dressed head to toe in black with gas masks.
It wasnt hard to recognize Thomas, Newt and the gang amongst the black dressed men and Fawn called out to them.
"Newt!"
The boy spun on his heel and a huge grin spread across his face, relief evident as Fawn hurried over to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. As she pulled back she swatted him in his good arm, making sure that it wasn't too hard.
"You idiot! You guys got too close and they picked up your trackers!"
Newt grinned sheepishly, "Sorry. We didn't mean to worry you."
"Fawn?" another voice spoke from behind the girl.
She turned around, not sure why the voice was so familiar and yet she couldn't quite place it.
The girl froze when a tall boy stepped out from the group of strangers, gas mask down and from the look of it, a brand new bloody lip forming (probably caused by Thomas since the boy was standing near with a fuming look on his face).
"Holy crap! Gally!?"
*****
"Would you stop glaring daggers through Gally's heart already Thomas?" Frypan whispered as the group sat in the dimply lit old abandoned building where Gally and his friends had been hiding out in since the maze. "He didnt mean to hurt Chuck and he hasn't done anything to you. Besides it's Newt's girl he is chatting to so no reason to be all territorial on him."
Newt snorted in amusement from where he stood nearby, calmly waiting for Gally and Fawn to finish catching up which involved Gally gushing and losing his mind over how far along Fawn was in her pregnancy even though you could barely see her bump. If Newt didnt know Gally well enough and didnt know that the large boy already had a thing for someone else, he would have thought that his bestie was crushing on Fawn but he knew well enough that Gally just had a soft spot for the red head.
"You didnt tell me you had a brother," Gally whispered to Fawn as the two glanced over at the Snipers and Assassins who were chatting it up with Gally's comrades, sharing war stories. "Who's the tall pretty one with him?" he whispered.
Fawn swatted him playfully on the shoulder, knowing full well that the athletically built boy wouldn't even feel the slap, "Oi! He's taken."
"By your brother I assume? I guessed from the way he is trying to kill me with his eyes. Sheesh! If looks could kill I would be twenty feet down the river, cremated and all. Oh well, I was just appreciating someone's good looks."
"You're hopeless," Fawn chuckled fondly. "In all seriousness though, will you be able to help us get Minho out?"
"Is that even a question at this point?" Gally faked offense, "You offend me by assuming such a thing! I can get Newt and Thomas in and we will infiltrate from within. As for getting the train full of kids out, we're going to need a plan 2.0."
"And you really thought you would get away with your plan without taking me along?" Fawn asked, crossing her arms.
Gally merely pointed down at Fawn's barely noticeable bump but Fawn slapped at his finger, "Nice try. Newt and Thomas and my brother have all been using that excuse multiple times to keep me from missions and every time, the mission goes to hell."
"HEY!" Newt and Thomas cried in protest.
Frypan smirked, "So you're saying that we are hopeless without you?"
Fawn shrugged, "Whatever you want to call it. I just know you guys are notorious for being rash and stupid when you have no supervision."
"She's got a point," Brenda muttered, no one realizing that she had joined in the conversation.
"Fine," Gally sighed. "it will be the three of us and Fawn but you are going to be incognito because you are on the red kill list that WICKED has posted on their fridge."
"You're out of your mind if you think we are going to let Fawn go with us," Newt objected.
"And you are her boyfriend and yet you still think that you can keep her back from sneaking along? At least this way we will know that she is tagging along. And besides, she is the only one of the four of us who can actually hit a target, let alone blind.... previously blind."
Newt opened his mouth to protest but he felt a small hand tap his elbow and he stopped, glancing at Fawn who gave him a secret look and he sighed.
"Well, no point in arguing with a wall, also known as a pregnant woman."
Fawn smiled in amusement before she got everyone's attention. "Okay so how are we going to kidnap Teresa?"
Fawn could tell right away that Brenda's mood plummeted from the time she had been talking with Feline and Auberon to the time she joined the gang at the table where they had laid out a map of the city. She looked over at Auberon and Feline but could tell from their expressions that it wasnt what they had talked about that ruined Brenda's mood.
"Its Teresa," Caliber whispered to his sister, "That is why Brenda's ornery."
Fawn nodded, "That makes more sense. You may have to chain Brenda down and me as well with her because if that girl is within a mile of me I will lop her head off and not regret it."
Caliber was mid chuckle when a shout from Newt made the siblings jump in unison. Newt had Thomas in a death grip by the collar again and was shouting in the latter's frightened face.
"Don't lie to me! DONT. LIE. TO ME!" he growled.
Fawn sighed, knowing full well why Newt was reacting this way. she also knew that if Gally was suffering from the same thing that Newt was then Gally's reaction would be ten times worse than what Newt's was but luckily Gally was immune, in his right mind and seemed to have a good grip on his raw emotions.
Fawn watched as Newt apologized softly to everyone present before he headed outside alone, Thomas following him shortly like a scolded puppy.
"Muffins anyone?" Lynx chirped, placing a huge pan of berry muffins on the table, instantly evaporating the tension in the room, Lynx flashing Fawn a cheeky grin which the girl returned.
"SO I take it we are still on to kidnap Teresa tomorrow?" Gally asked around a mouthful of muffin.
"I till have to be me, you and someone else posing as Thomas otherwise Thomas's tracker will alert wicked to our presence," Fawn replied.
"ooh!" Puma cried excitedly, "Ive got one of those holographic suits! I just need to scan Thomas and I can be your decoy."
Fawn nodded in agreement when suddenly something began beeping in her pocket. She excused herself before anyone could notice. She pulled a small multitracker out of her jeans and saw a small red dot flashing on the map, located within a min, flickering as it moved around. And nearby, a green dot as well. A smile crept onto her face. "Right on time."
***************
It was pitch dark in the lower garage where they were waiting patiently for Teresa to arrive. Mace had managed to hack into the  monitor in Teresa's office, sending her a message from "Thomas" which was really from Mace telling her to meet him secretly in the garage. The snipers and assassins minus Puma were waiting in ambush, should Teresa pull a Teresa on them and not come alone.
Fawn and Gally were waiting nearby with Puma, dressed in the holographic suit which made him look like Thomas from far off. The only way Teresa would know it wasnt Thomas under the hoodie was if Puma broke character or if she touched him. Gally tensed, the sack in his hand at the ready when the girl in question made her appearance, garbed head to toe in doctor's attire.
It took all of Fawn's willpower to not scoff. Who in their right mind had given a teenage brat access to doctor's clothing and chances were, she was also allowed to do things that only a trained doctor should be doing. Secondly, did she really think she would impress Thomas by coming to meet him secretly by night dressed as a psychopathic murder doctor? She seems to have forgotten how petrified Thomas and the gang were because of the people in doctor's uniforms.
Fawn watched as Teresa tried to approach Puma but the boy wisely kept eight feet of distance between them.
"Come on Thomas. you know I would never hurt you."
Puma scoffed, "Tell that to Minho who you have tied to a table, experimenting on him like a lab rat."
"Its what needs to be done for the greater good. We are on the brink of finding the cure Thomas."
Puma smirked, flashing Fawn a knowing look, "There already is a cure but you and Wicked refuse to believe it because if a cure was discovered then Wicked wouldn't have the control over people the way that it does now."
Teresa's face split into shock but Fawn knew well enough that it was fake. "What cure? What are you talking about?"
"Cut the crap," Puma snarked, "The antidote formula was purposely leaked to Wicked in order to form a cure using the resources that Wicked had in store but they hid the formula in the archives to prevent their control being wiped away. This pandemic is the only thing keeping Wicked in control. Fawn stole the archives back from Wicked which is why you guys are hunting her down, out of fear that she will leak the truth."
"I dont believe you," Teresa scoffed.
Puma shrugged, tapping something on his wrist which turned off the hologram and Teresa jumped when she came face to face with Puma, whom she had never met before, rather than Thomas.
"I know because I was the first one that Fawn cured." Puma whispered, lifting his shirt to reveal that his chest was covered in scars. Old scars that looked like he had been infected with the flare but then all the poison had been sucked out. "I was practically a crank when she found me. As for you, we dont need you really. We just are going to use you as a means to rescue Minho."
A loud bang broke the silence and everyone jumped to see that Fawn had hit Teresa over the back of the head with her longbow. "What? She had it coming." she shrugged as Gally tied and gagged the unconscious girl. "That's only the appetizer of what she is going to get."
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
Text
Come Back Home - Chapter 1
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"FAWN! Fawn where are you?" Minho called as he looked around the glade for the girl who had not come up for dinner yet.
"Over here Minho!" Fawn called back.
​​​​​​​The boy followed her voice only to find her crouching in front of the closed gates of the maze. She had two glass bottles beside her, full of thick liquid that looked like paint of some sort and Minho gawked as he saw that the girl had painted flowers around all the names that were etched on the stone. Some of the flowers were green, some blue, some white and some red.
"That's beautiful Fawn!" The boy whispered.
Fawn smiled, "I thought it would look nice. Do you think Alby would mind?"
​​​​​​​Minho grinned, "He will probably love it and demand that you do it to the rest of the walls!"
​​​​​​​The two laughed as Gally continued to shout their names until they finally joined the rest of the boys for dinner.
​​​​​​​--------
Fawn sighed as she placed her bow back on the table in front of her and observed the targets that she had been practicing on. It had been 3 months since Minho had been taken, 3 months since Fawn and the gang had escaped the maze, and 3 months since Fawn had gotten a new bow gifted to her by her brother Caliber. The gang had settled in nicely at the hidden compound but that still didnt mean they weren't on alert. Vince had decided that he didnt trust the Rose members enough to stay at the compound so he and the rest of the Right Arm had remained in the nearby mountains. Fawn and the gang would head up to visit the Right Arm almost every day to plan on how to rescue Minho.
A knock behind her alerted her to someone else being present and Fawn turned to see Trigger and Saber standing there. She smiled at their leisure outfits, oversized hoodies and sweatpants. The Right Arm, Vince an even the rest of the gang still couldn't believe that the Assassins and Snipers were actually real people beneath their tough exteriors. But Fawn knew them inside and out. Frypan and Thomas almost fainted from shock when they found Caliber and Arrow cuddling on the couch in the lounge one evening, enjoying a moment of PDA without the rest of the Assassins wolf whistling at them. They also didnt understand why Fawn found it absolutely hilarious whenever Trigger annoyed Caliber to the point of insanity and Caliber would drag Trigger into his bunker to have "a talk" with him.
Truth was, no one but Fawn knew or technically understood that the Assassins were all fluffy softies. The harshest reality about these guys when they weren't on a mission was that when Caliber was mad at someone (Mostly Trigger because Trigger just liked to trigger him) he would have "a talk" with them which involved him explaining how disappointed he was with them and tell them that they needed to fix the situation. Honestly that wasnt that harsh or scary but Caliber could look pretty intimidating when he was angry and he had such a strong patience that when he did have to have "a talk" with one of the assassins, it made the member guilty because they knew they had crossed the line too far and while they loved to poke fun at their smol leader, they hated it when he was upset or disappointed with them.
"What are you two doing here?" Fawn asked, closing her bow and placing it in the front pocket of her hoodie.
"Caliber asked us to stay behind to make sure you didnt follow them." Saber explained.
Fawn grinned, "Did Caliber say that.... or were you two too preoccupied this morning to remember that you had somewhere to be?"
Saber immediately blushed and rubbed the back of his neck while Trigger grinned mischievously, "Maybe both?"
"Okay okay," Fawn chuckled. "Ill let it pass. Im sure they will have enough hands to help what with the whole team out there."
It had also been 3 months since Fawn had revealed to the others that she was pregnant which put her at almost 4 months into her pregnancy. She was barely showing, only a small bump visible which was easily hidden beneath her hoodies which she always wore now since the weather was getting colder. However, not only was it Newt, Frypan and Thomas who were over the top protective of her, it was also Caliber, the rest of the assassins and all of the Snipers.
That was why while the rest of the Rose were out helping the gang rescue Minho, Fawn was ordered to stay at the compound.... and probably why Caliber had left Trigger and Saber to keep an eye on her.
It was at that moment that they heard the pounding of propellors and quickly rushed to the landing pad to see the copter land on the pad having just set down a train car that they had obviously stolen.
Fawn's face lit up and she was about to rush over to the others only to see Newt storm past, face scrunched up in anger and then Thomas and the others poured out of the jeep, equally upset looks on their faces. Obviously the plan did not go well.
"Probably not the best idea to talk to them right now," Caliber whispered to his sister as he approached, hair ruffled and looking a little worn out. "Several things did not go as planned. Because of the strong radioactive attraction that our ships put out, we agreed to only take the Right Arm's helicopter to avoid attracting more WICKED backup. Needless to say WICKED was already prepared, obviously knowing that we would try to rescue Minho and they had three helicopter backups. We did not have time to go back and grab our own ships to deal with them so we had to rush and could only take one of the cars back rather than the whole train.... turns out the car that we did manage to take did not have Minho in it."
Fawn's shoulders slumped, "Oh shit... so that's why Newt is mad."
"Well he was also partially mad because he suggested we bring our own ships anyway because we would out number the WICKED backup 10 to 1 even if they did detect our ships but Thomas was positive there wouldn't be any extra security," Feline added as he strolled over.
"You should probably go talk to him Fawn," Frypan whispered from where Lynx and Puma were supporting him. Apparently he had sprained his ankle trying to get into the jeep during the scuffle.
"Are you out of your mind!?" Caliber whisper yelled, "I know Newt is not exactly the same person he was before the maze but that guy is hella scary when he is mad and he is fuming right now!"
Frypan looked over at Fawn before he responded to Caliber, "You're right. We have only seen him get angry maybe once in the past year and while he does tend to get physically angry when he is pissed, Fawn is the only person who can talk to him without being in danger of being mauled. It's either let him go talk to him and calm him down or none of us can be around him for at least two days until he cools down by himself."
****
“Newt?” Fawn spoke softly as she poked her head inside the room that she and Newt had resided in for the last few months. “May I come in?”
She got no response from the boy who was sitting silently on the bed so she entered, closing the door behind her before she sat down beside him.
“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked gently as she ran her hand over his back.
Newt looked at her and Fawn recognized that look. It was the look he gave her when he did not want to talk about it but he wanted her to talk to him.
“I spoke with Caliber. There was no way you guys could have known for sure which car had Minho in it and it was just a mistake on agreement that you guys resorted to not taking the ships with you. You still saved dozens of kids from torture and sure death and while Minho might have not been one of them, that does not mean that we will not still rescue him. We just need to make a new plan to rescue a few more.”
Newt’s shoulders slumped as he sighed before he leant against Fawn’s shoulder. the girl gently and cautiously stroked his arm, earning her a pained hiss from the boy.
“Its gotten worse?” she whispered. “When will you tell the others?”
Newt shook his head, “Not until I cannot hide it anymore. It will distract them and I don’t want them to baby me when their priority should be getting Minho back.”
Fawn nodded in understanding before she pressed a kiss to the boy’s sandy locks. A knock at the door had the two lifting their heads to find Arrow standing there with a worried look on his face.  
“Things are not exactly pretty out here you guys.”
Instantly the two were on their feet and hurrying after the young man who led them back outside to the landing pad to see Thomas and Brenda shouting at each other.
“No, we are not kidnapping Teresa!” Thomas shouted.
Brenda scoffed, obviously trying to keep her fuming anger in check. “Well I’m sorry that your girl crush betrayed us and got Minho kidnapped in the first place!”
“Oi!” Newt called, getting everyone’s attention. “I don’t know what you are yammering about but it is not going to get Minho back.”
“This idiot doesn’t want us to kidnap Teresa to get access to the compound,” Brenda complained, her anger scaring the Snipers who were all hiding behind each other. “She is the only one we can kidnap fand possibly get real information out of. She likes herself too much to die before she gives us information while the rest of Wicked would gladly go the long route to hell if it means not leaking information to us.”
“She will get in trouble if Wicked finds out that she was the one who helped us,” Thomas retorted.
A loud snort made everyone look at Fawn who was the culprit of the sound. “I am sorry but I find it absolutely hilarious that she betrayed us, resulting in over 100 people dying and Minho being taken and yet you are worried that Wicked will put her in time out if we squeeze information out of her? Hate to break it to you Thomas but whether we kidnap her or not, I am going to make her feel hell before I send her there for what she did and will probably do to Minho. Kidnapping her would be the nice thing to do because if we don’t, she is going to experience a whole different kind of pain before I am finished with her.”
“We are not going to put Teresa’s well-being over Minho’s,” Newt told Thomas, trying to keep calm. “She lost that privilege when she is planning to chop him up for his blood.”
“She’s not going to chop him up!” Thomas snapped back but that was a mistake for Newt finally snapped and was on the boy in an instant, gripping him by the collar and shouting in his face.
“Get your fucking girlfriend out of your head and don’t be an idiot!”
Everything became intensely silent as everyone watched Newt, shocked at his sudden outrage because he rarely raised his voice let alone almost tackled someone.
“Newt,” Fawn called gently and Newt released Thomas, seemingly snapping out of his blind rage.
“Sorry,” he mumbled before he wandered off, everyone watching him go.
Frypan was preparing to following him when Fawn stopped him and turned to Thomas.
“Go and fix this,” She told him, a warning tone in her voice.
The boy nodded sheepishly before he scurried after his friend who had disappeared around the compound.
“What was that all about?” Harriet whispered.
She got not reply from Fawn who glanced at Caliber to see her brother giving her an identical look. The look that only the two siblings would understand and it said more than what words could convey in this situation.
“Newt will tell you in his own time,” Fawn explained. But let the two of them figure themselves out first. We should decide on how we are going to scout out the city without getting killed.”
Everyone nodded and began to make their way indoors, leaving Caliber and Fawn alone outside on the landing pad in the gradually falling snow.
Fawn extended her hand to her brother who placed a small metal object in her palm which she quickly stuffed into her pocket and away from peeking eyes.
“He has got five days,” Caliber whispered.
“Make it six,” Fawn whispered back. “We need an extra day to get Teresa under control and cooperative.”
Caliber merely nodded before walking away. “I will make adjustments.”
When Fawn was left entirely alone, a smirk crept onto her face. “I’m sorry Newt.”
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You chapter 10
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Chapter 10
When Fawn cracked her eyes open she found Thomas and Frypan hovering over her like gargoyles. She did not speak but gave them a look telling them that they had better have a good reason for waking her.
"They have arrived," Thomas whispered, glancing over his shoulder as if expecting someone to knock him out from behind. "The assassins...."
Fawn had never gotten out of bed so quickly before, glad that the clothes she had worn to bed were presentable (a white t-shirt and baggy grey sweats). She approached the open door to see Newt standing at the railing, looking down into the open area. She joined him at the railing and instantly her eyes locked on the 8 figures that she never thought she would see again.
Everyone in the whole compound was awake, peering over railings while the Red Rose and White Rose were below, having gone to greet the Black Rose.
"Oi! Fawn!" Lynx's voice shouted from below, breaking the silence and drawing all eyes to the girl.
the eight men dressed head to toe in black stared at her with no expression, making Frypan and Thomas shiver in slight fear.
"What do we do now?" Brenda whispered next to Fawn.
"We go say hello," the redhead responded as she strode towards the elevator.
Once she reached the first floor, she approached the group while her friends hung back at a safe distance. The Snipers backed away so that she could approach the eight assassins. Next to Fawn, the eight men were practically giants.
Garbed entirely in black, they were incredibly intimidating. While the Snipers had been slightly intimidating, these guys had the intimidating looks to match their auras.
One of the eight was slightly smaller than the others by perhaps half a head. His bright orange hair was styled in a mullet, away from his piercing eyes. He had a petite, rather pretty nose and plump lips in a perfect cupids bow. While he looked smol compared to his giant companions, it was clear that he was in charge because of the the powerful aura that oozed off of him.
He was dressed in black slacks, a black turtleneck and a knee length trench coat. Atop his orange hair sat a black wide rimmed black hat. One would have thought he was a mystery rancher or the grim reaper what with the hat and the black dress boots.
Directly to his right, at his side was the tallest of the group. Elegant and slender almost with a femanine elegance. His face was well defined with a perfect nose, wide elegant lips and piercing eyes. His hair was jet black and wavy, matching perfectly with his outfit which consisted of a slightly paler black shirt underneath a black corset that surprisingly suited him very well, matched with bootcut black slacks and dress shoes.
Behind the tall assassin were two who looked like they could be brothers, both with softer, rather mature features with straight noses, sharply defined lips and friendly eyes. Both wore black pants, black dress shoes and black turtle neck shirts underneath waist length black leather jackets.
To the leader's left stood the second tallest. Of a similar elegance and slender build to the tallest member. His cheekbones were very finely defined, a firm jaw and sharp features. His eyebrows were almost haunting. His lips were elegant and average plumpness and were pursed seriously. He had a scar running through his left eyebrow. HIs jet black hair was straight and cut so that it fell perfectly over his forehead. He wore a simple black shirt, leather pants and a pair of leather ankle boots and black trench coat.
Behind him was an assassin slightly shorter with a more athletic build but a cheeky glint in his pretty eyes. He looked like he could be one of the youngest of the group, his hair probably the longest of the group pulled back in a man bun and half black, half blond. He had a petite nose, plump lips and a distinctive mole below his left eye. Directly behind him was the most intimidating duo of the bunch. Curly silver hair topped the first man's head, thick and stern eyebrows and a burning gaze. He had full lips and a straight nose. He wore casual clothes made up of a large black hoodie and baggy cargo pants. Obviously the baggy look was intentional for the man directly at his side wore tight black pants and a snug black turtle neck that went well with his calm face, elegant lips and beautiful eyes. His hair was also silver but wavy and parted in the center.
The leader took an extra step towards Fawn before a huge grin spread across his face.
"hello sis!"
A matching smile appeared on Fawn's face before she met the smol leader in a tight hug. Instantly all the serious faces vanished into wide sales as Fawn gave each of the assassins a hug.
"Wait.... he is her brother?" Thomas whispered.
"Newt!?" a voice shouted.
The boy in question looked around to see that the person who had called his name was the boy who had called Fawn his sister. Fawn trotted over to Newt and pulled him to the group of assassins.
"Newt, you will not remember my brother...."
"Hongjoong," Newt muttered and everyone froze as he said the leader's real name before turning and looking at the tallest member, "And Seongwha."
"yo, how does he know their real names?" the other tall assassin whispered to his partner. "I thought he was brainwashed."
"Zip it Saber, they are talking."
Newt glanced around at the other faces, forehead creased in confusion, "I dont remember you guys.... but why can I remember your names?"
Hongjoong, Fawn's brother smiled, "This is Saber, his buddy is Trigger. Behind them are Blade and Ruger. Magnum and Mace are the brothers....I guess you already know Arrow's real name and my code name is Caliber." he explained. "You never met the others before the maze but you and I were close growing up and Arrow.... well...."
Newt waited for Hongjoong, or Caliber to explain but Fawn was the one who spoke up.
"Let's just say that Arrow as your best friend growing up and when you found out that Arrow and Caliber were dating you nearly threw Caliber off a cliff."
Newt's eyes widened in shock and Fawn could tell that Thomas and Frypan were about to ask for all the deets so she changed the subject.
"While I am overjoyed to see you dear brother, what are you doing here so early? you weren't expected for another two days."
"We needed to get these things to you before you guys did something stupid," Caliber explained as Ruger drew out a large satchel.
Caliber reached into the bag and drew out a small dagger.
"The ancient weapons," Feline whispered to Thomas and Brenda, "Our ancestors used to Mae weapons from the branches of Uthana plant and they were see as Sacred Weapons. The assassins have kept up the tradition and fashioned weapons just like the ancients did."
"Thomas," Caliber said, "This is for you."
Thomas Gingerly took the knife and nodded as he was too stunned to speak.
"Frypan," Arrow spoke next, handing him a small ball, "Its a grenade."
The whole building went deathly still. Why did they hand him a grenade!?
"It will only light if you throw it at least eight feet in the air," Caliber assured him.
"Newt my man," Caliber said as he held out another knife, this one longer and more slender than Thomas's.
"And lastly Fawn.... since you alway lose your bow," he teased his sister as he drew out a foldable bow and arrows set almost identical to her previous ones.
"These are...." Newt muttered. "Amazing.... thank you but... why are you giving us weapons?"
Arrow and Caliber exchanged looks before Arrow spoke.
"Because when we rescue Minho, a war will start. And it will only end if either we or Wicked are wiped from the face of the planet."
TADA!!!!!! Well, that is the end of book 2! I will try to get book 3 started sometime this or next week:) Once it is finished on Quotev, I will move it over here. If you want to read it in progress, check out my Quotev: FairyofHogwarts.
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You chapter 9
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Chapter 9
When the two White Rose ships landed, the first thing that all the kids did was poke their heads out the window to see just where they were. They had flown all through the night and had slept the whole ride. However now, the sun was rising and they could now see what lay before them.
A huge building rose up before them like a giant wall of maze that loomed over them. It almost looked like a dog.... or a dinosaur of some sort. The kind that swam in the water with the long open snout. It was a rough and almost crude shape with the red glow indicating lights that were on inside.
The helicopters stopped running and soon the kids were able to hear themselves breathe as they hopped out of the aircrafts. The first thing they noticed was that the headquarters was settled between two vast mountain ranges, deep in the valley literally hidden beneath canopies of trees and vines. There was a long flat plane on each side of the building that served as landing sites for the aircrafts. In the landing area they had landed on in the very front, the group could see that the landing sight to the left of them was occupied by green aircrafts that were smaller than the white rose helicopters but bulkier and larger than the very small, lean red aircrafts that were occupied in the neighboring landing site.
In the landing site to their right was where the small jet black aircrafts were landed, small and almost dangerous looking like giant wasps that only looked big enough for 2 at the max. In the landing site next to the Assassin's aircrafts were the gigantic, well protected Blue Rose carriers that looked to be built to carry dozens of people at once.
"Is this the headquarters for all of Thorn?" Newt asked, looking around in awe at the architecture.
"This is just one of a chain," Auberon explained with a smile as he and the rest of the Snipers led the group of survivors and the surviving Right Arm towards the front doors of the building. "There is a Thorn Headquarters for every division. This is the headquarters for Thorn that is run by Snipers but regardless of who runs each headquarters, every division is welcome and equally important. We have members from every division here at this headquarters today because of your presence. We called in the envoys from each division."
When the boys tilted their head in question at Auberon's explanation, Leo spoke up. "The envoys are the strongest, best, most talented of each division. Not to brag or anything but the eight of us are the Envoys for Red Rose. You actually encountered a few of the Envoys from White Rose. They were the ones who flew the carriers to get you out of the fix last night."
The group all turned to look back at the 7 white rose envoys who had stepped off their carriers and were following them at a distance. Now the kids understood how these people were not real. They looked too perfect, too beautiful and flawless to be real. They all wore pure white outfits from head to toe. Their hair colors were all black or dark brown and perfectly styled. Their skin was pale and smooth, absolutely flawless and they walked beautifully like a horse that was well trained to prance elegantly. They looked to any person to be very normal, dressed in human clothes with everything that was human but the thing that gave them away was their perfection. They were perfect.
The tallest of the 7 was obviously the leader for he was the only one who wore black sunglasses and a white cap on his head. He had full lips and a very leadenly, commanding presence for someone who was a robot. On the upper right corner just above his heart, or where his heart would reside if he was human, was the name: Gemini.
On his direct right was the second tallest in the group, leaner than Gemini with the kind of looks that just screamed: I am too perfect to be human. Full lips, big eyes and perfectly styled dark brown hair. On his shirt was the name: Sagi
Just slightly behind Sagi and Gemini were two shorter boys. One with sharp, almost intimidating looks while the other looked bright and bubbly with a smile on his face. The smiling one was holding the other's hand and practically dragging him along. On the smiling boy's shirt was printed the name: Aquari. The other boy who looked like he could fall asleep in mid stride had the name Pisce written on his shirt.
Lastly bringing up their rear were the other three who apparently could pass off as the youngest since they had younger features and seemed to have brighter, more youthful personalities (for robots that is) compared to the first 4. The shortest of all the boys was close behind Pisce, the only one wearing a tank top, showing off his impossibly perfectly sculpted arms. He was chatting so fast with Pisce it was almost impossible to see the name Libra printed on his shirt.
The last two who brought up the rear obviously weren't paying attention to where they were walking. They both were similar height but it was clear that the more athletic built of the two was taller. He had a big smile, almost like a bunny with fluffy black hair and big eyes like a baby deer. On his shirt was printed the name: Virgo.
The shorter of the two, lean and slender with elegant features had his arms looped around Virgo's neck and was whispering things in his ears, pecking his cheek or just playfully nuzzling his nose or forehead against the taller boy's face. it was clear that Capri, as written on his shirt, was very clingy to Virgo and it appeared that Virgo rather enjoyed the attention.
The group of seven took a turn and continued to walk towards the headquarters, not once glancing back at the Snipers and the survivors.
Thomas and Frypan were staring at the 7 go, mouths dangling open and fingers pointing. it was Lynx who chuckled and spoke up to end their misery.
"Yes they are robots but we, more specifically Fawn, found ways to compute them where they can develop habits similar to humans after being around them for a long time, sort of like how animals begin to mimic humans. Gemini and his crew have been active for almost 6 years and thus have had time to adapt and have developed ways of communicating in a similar fashion to how humans express emotion."
"Can they feel it?" Newt asked. "The emotion?"
"That is something we cannot know." Lynx replied. "Come on, Auberon wont wait for us."
The survivors followed Lynx as he hurried to catch up to his leader and fellow Snipers as they walked through the double doors, through a few scanners before they came upon a huge open room. There were at least 20 spiral staircases made of metal that wound up to the different levels for the open room that was like a giant ballroom had multiple layers like a giant library. There were at least 12 floors with dozens and dozens of doorways on each floor.
"Follow me," Auberon instructed the group while the Snipers veered off towards a different direction.
The group followed Auberon up one spiral staircase that led to the second floor and through one of the doorways that led into a rather cozy looking office type of lounge.
"This is our groups' lounge area. You are welcome to rest here whilst we get rooms situated for all of you. There is going to be a gathering tomorrow afternoon once all of the envoys from the divisions are present," Auberon explained. "They are going to want to hear from you Fawn and also from the leader of the Right Arm."
Vince perked up at that but said nothing. Obviously he wasn't sure what to think of an organization as advanced at Thorn being commanded primarily by children, or at least young adults.
"Where did the other Snipers go?" Harriet asked, looking around when she noticed that Grace was also gone.
"They went to de robe. They should be back soon. They also prepared gifts for your arrival. Every Envoy from each division prepared something for you."
Fawn perked up at this, obviously confused. She went to open her mouth to ask why when Auberon smiled. "You remember that Christmas tradition you made two years before you left? How we would exchange presents when we saw each other at Christmas? Well you have all missed many Christmases with us, so we are catching up."
A soft smile appeared on Fawn's face just as the door opened and in stepped the missing Snipers. Grace was nowhere to be found, probably resting after having followed Fawn for months. The Snipers were now all dressed in simple sweat pants and t-shirts. Bengal and Puma carried two duffle bags each which they set on the coffee table in front of the group who had hesitantly sat their dusty butts on the clean couches.
"Here are some fresh clothes for you," Puma began, immediately getting everyone's attention and most of the kids inched closer with excitement at having fresh, unripped clothes.
"There are shirts in this one, pants in this one, socks and underwear in this one and this one has coats and sweaters. We keep it cool in the buildings so that things don't overheat and it helps keep the dust off if we ever have to venture into the sands." Bengal finished as he pointed to each bag.
"We also will show you where the showers are if you would like to freshen up before changing," Rowel added.
At the sound of showers, there were several sighs and moans of relief and joy from the dusty survivors.
"We also have individually prepared gifts for each of you," Feline added. "As Fawn has probably told you, instead of having us protect her, she had each of us protect or watch over someone close to her. Several of us kept an eye on Teresa, the one who betrayed you, but each of us actually protected each of you."
Leo stepped forward and placed a small red wrapped present on the table before stepping back, "I was entrusted with the safety of Minho. I am sorry that I failed in that area and I will do whatever it takes to get him back."
Newt and Fawn both stood up and walked over to give the boy a hug, aware that the boy was not one to show emotion but in that moment he almost cried.
Serval and Lynx were next, stepping forward to place a gift in Frypan and Thomas's laps respectively. Frypan opened his present to find freshly designed kitchenware. One of the cooking spoons he held up to reveal that it had a button on it.
"it cools the food," Lynx explained, bouncing with excitement, "So you dont burn yourself when you taste it."
Frypan's hands almost shook as tears pricked his eyes, "Thank you!"
Thomas opened his box to reveal a compass that could be strapped to his wrist. "So you dont get lost," Serval replied with a deadpan expression.
Auberon and Feline stepped forward to place a present in Fawn and in Newt's laps. Newt opened his box to reveal a pocketknife with multiple functions from different sized screwdrivers, to a small pen knife, a small laser, and so on. He flashed Auberon a bright smile who returned it in kind.
When Fawn opened up the box Feline gave her, she almost choked on her own breath. Inside was a small, thin almost lacy wrap of ruby red fabric.
"You...." Fawn choked as she looked at Feline, "You made it!"
Feline nodded, a smile gracing his lips. "I know when you left I still hadn't perfected the formula to create the fabric but Auberon and Lynx helped me and I managed to make enough that I could make something small. When we found out that you were expecting, I decided to make it into something the little one could wear."
"What fabric is it?" Newt asked curiously.
"Its a special fabric that is made by Snipers," Feline explained. "It was developed by Fawn using a formula that used special heat and mixtures to melt the bullet cartridges that we lose whenever we fired a shot. We collect them, melt them down and form this material that is lightweight and cool in the summer but warm in the winter and it is actually bullet proof to an extent."
Fawn held up the piece of fabric that looked like it had taken a long time and with lots of work. She could see the little places where Feline had trouble and where he had succeeded. it was a small blanket but the perfect size for a child.
Rowel took that as his chance to pounce forward with another box for Fawn which she opened to reveal an identical piece of fabric.
"Since you didnt know I was on the Sniper team, I took it upon myself to help Feline protect you and the baby, so I made you one just in case Feline's wears out or it is dirty and you need a backup."
Fawn smiled at the young boy before giving both him and Feline a hug. "Thank you boys, this is perfect!"
Fawn glanced over at Puma who was hanging his head, a present grasped in his hands. "We will get Aris back," she assured him. "I promise. And I promise it was not your fault that he was taken."
Puma nodded, before giving her a box smile.
It was Bengal who stepped forward last, opening the box he held with his bottom lip trembling. He pulled out a very carefully hand crafted piece of leather that looked like a utility belt with different pouches and places to hang knives and other things. He placed it on the table before stepping back, feeling everyone's confused eyes on him before he spoke shakily.
"I'm sorry...."
With that the boy turned and left the room with Leo charging after him to console the broken hearted boy. The survivors watched him go slightly confused before they turned back to the matter at hand.
"You should all get washed up and rested," Auberon spoke up, "The assassins will be here by morning and lets just say they have a lot to talk with you about Fawn."
The girl smiled and nodded as she and the others gathered up the clothes they had selected and headed after Auberon who showed them where the showers were. Just when the four remaining gladers were about to part ways, Frypan bent in and whispered to Fawn.
"Who was the present for that Bengal made?" he whispered. "Who was it that you assigned him to protect?"
Fawn swallowed thickly, eyes shining with unshed tears. "Winston."
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You Chapter 8
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Chapter 8
"So.... let me get this straight," Thomas said, holding up his hands amidst the happy chattering that was going on between Newt, Frypan, and the youngest Sniper: Rowel. "You guys know each other?"
"No shit Sherlock," Harriet observed as she waved her hands in the direction of the hysterical three boys. "Do you think complete strangers would be this happy to see each other?"
"We..... we were...." Frypan choked out between sobs as he held the boy in a headlock hug. "We were in the maze together!"
"huh!?" Everyone cried at once.
Newt nodded his head vigorously as he fondly petted Rowel's hair (the only thing that Frypan allowed him to touch since the hysterical boy was refusing to let Rowel go). "We thought he was dead!"
Very slowly Rowel pried himself from the tight grip Frypan had him in and it was clear that the young boy had been crying as well, eyes puffy and face damp. "Technically I was dead."
Everyone gave him a questioning look, prompting him to explain but it was Auberon who interrupted, "Guys we cannot stay here much longer. They will be back with fresh backup. Lets get to the carriers. we can talk on the way."
Without even thinking of questioning him, everyone began to follow the boy up the mountain towards where the Grenades had landed the two carriers on the flat surface of the mountain.
"You were stung by a griever," Newt pointed out to Rowel, he and Frypan literally stuck to the boy's side. "And then you were banished to the maze.... how in the world did you survive a sting and the maze?"
"I have my brother to thank for that," Rowel explained, patting Auberon on the shoulders.
"You two are brothers!?" Frypan cried, the boy literally on the verge of fainting from all the new information he was getting.
Auberon smiled as he wrapped an arm around Rowell's lean shoulders. "I refused to let Rowel be a Sniper. Needless to say that didn't stop him and he smuggled his way onto one of my missions."
Fawn's eyes widened and she turned to look at the boy who was at least a year younger than her. "Rowel.... you didnt...."
The boy rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly like a puppy that had been scolded. "I overheard Bengal and Leo talking about how Auberon was going to try and get you out of Wicked....and I wanted to help....."
"But he was in the maze months before Fawn ended up in the maze," Newt pointed out. "If he got captured after Fawn.... how would he have ended up in the maze first?"
"I was in Wicked's possession for almost a year," Fawn reminded her boyfriend. "Remember, they had to try several different techniques to get me brainwashed."
Rowel nodded. "instead of helping, I got caught instead and ended up in the maze. Auberon kept a close eye on me while in was in there. When I got stung and banished to the maze, he found more shortly after a Griever did. it had bitten me on the stomach..."
At that moment, they had arrived at the carriers and the members of Right Arm, plus Brenda and Grace hopped onto one carrier while the other kids joined the Snipers on the second carrier.
"How did you survive getting bit?" Frypan asked.
Rowel reached down and pulled up his shirt to reveal a large, ghastly looking scar that covered most of the right side of his abdomen. "That's the thing.... From what we know of grievers, their sting contains a small amount of the flare. That was why Wicked put the Grievers out there in the first place, to test to see if anyone who got stung would survive. Either I was immune or there was something sketchy going on because when Auberon brought me back to the headquarters, I was just bandaged up and hooked to a monitor while I healed."
"And you recovered?" Newt gasped. "But you had been really bad when you got banished.... like you had started flaring up and almost attacking people."
Rowel nodded. "That's why it always seemed fishy to me."
Everyone held on tight as the carrier slowly lifted from the ground and no one was aware of the sudden shocked look that crossed Fawn's face as if she just suddenly realized something. She quickly brushed it off and turned her attention to Leo and Bengal.
"So.... you two are still as thick as thieves I see."
Bengal immediately ducked his head as if preparing to blush while a pleased smirk flashed across Leo's face.
"Please dont encourage them," Puma groaned. "They are like rabbits in spring now! They are almost worse than Lynx and Serval."
"You are one to talk pups," Bengal immediately pounced back, pointing an accusing finger at the other boy. "you and Auberon are practically glued at the hip and dont think that just because Leo and I sleep down the hall from you two that we don't hear you thumping at two o'clock in the morning!"
Auberon's ears immediately went red. "That isn't us!"
"Oh really?" Bengal asked, crossing his arms and legs, everyone else in the carrier leaning forward to enjoy the spectacle. "Don't tell me you still haven't done the deed my man."
The carrier went utterly quiet, Auberon glancing wildly between Bengal and Puma who was just as beet red as he was. It was Leo who broke the silence, placing a hand on his boyfriend's shoulder. "Baby, they haven't yet."
Bengal's accusing face vanished and his mouth dropped open in complete disbelief. "WHAT!? You've been dating for the better half of two months! What is it? Can't decide who botto...."
"Okay I think that's enough baby," Leo hissed, covering Bengal's mouth before he scarred their two friends for life.
"So," Fawn chuckled, leaning forward. "Did you finally tell him Auberon?"
Auberon scratched the back of his neck, "It was more like Serval and Feline lock us up in a closet together and refuse to let us leave until we talked.... In the end he said it first."
A huge grin appeared on Fawn's face as she wrapped the two in a tight hug. "I'm so happy for you!!!!!!! And don't you mind Bengal, not everyone has to be a bed warmer like he is."
"HEY!" Bengal screeched. "I am not a bed warmer! I just happen to be dating Leo is all."
Leo raised an eyebrow, unsure if that was an insult or a compliment.
Fawn however diverted the conversation by turning to Serval and Lynx. As per usual, Lynx had both arms wrapped around Serval's large shoulders from behind, his small chin resting on Serval's broad shoulder. Serval was the kind of boy who did not voice or show his affections or emotions very clearly. He had a kind of volcano quick temper and was someone who was very proud of his looks to the point where he would try to get people to admit that he was handsome. Fawn knew that the main reason why the boy was like that was because in their early years when Serval was new to the Snipers, some senior members (who had long ago been fired) told him that he was the least good looking out of all the Snipers.
And then that was where Lynx came in. A bright, bubbly boy that was literally a 24/7 ball of sunshine was the only person who seemed to be the recipient of Serval's entirety of love and affection. It was clear from the beginning that Serval liked Lynx more than he liked the rest of the Snipers and as their trainer back in the day, Fawn had pertained it to Serval and Lynx being polar opposites and Serval liking the constant attention Lynx gave him. Lynx was clingy and touchy-feely with everyone because that was his form of communicating his emotions and feelings. However with Serval it was significantly more and Fawn could tell that Serval had an affect on the bubbly ball of joy and it was clear from the beginning that Lynx had a crush. Whether it was a puppy dog crush or true love, Fawn knew that whatever it started out to be, it ended up becoming full blown head-over-heels madly in love on Lynx's part.
It took years of the two being joined at the hip for Fawn to finally realize that it had never been a one-sided love from the start. It was just very hard to see from the onlooker's perspective that Serval had returned Lynx's affections from the start. He showed it in little things such as complimenting Lynx when he did a good job, never getting angry at Lynx even when the boy clung to him (Which was something very unusual for Serval who would bellow at anyone who clung to him or invaded his personal space). In one respect, Serval was very similar to his little brother Feline (half-brothers which explains the significant difference in height), they both hated skinship and were technically 'anti romantics'.
But when it came to Lynx, Serval dropped his brother code that he had with Feline and let Lynx hang on him, cuddle with him. It wasn't until they were officially Snipers that Fawn heard from Feline and Leo that within two weeks of knowing each other, Serval had kissed Lynx (on the cheek) and shortly after she caught wind of a rumor that supposedly they were together. It was officially confirmed when Serval was having one of his temper flare ups (Bengal had stolen his rice crisps) and Lynx planted himself in front of Serval who's anger had immediately disappeared and he had planted a wet one of Lynx right then and there in front of all their gawking mates.
Fawn, being the only girl of the Snipers, had become the silent shipper who supported the boys in anything and everything they did. When Leo admitted that he was infatuated with Bengal and had asked for some advice on how to get his attention (Bengal had a brain of steel so it was literally impossible to hint at anything to him. You seriously needed a sledge hammer to get something through to him), Fawn had immediately supported the lovesick boy and had been overjoyed when she realized Bengal shared similar (maybe not as erotic as Leo's) feelings to Leo and the two immediately became an item barely a year after Lynx and Serval did.
It also wasn't a surprise to Fawn to find out that Auberon and Puma were a thing now. Nor was she surprised that it took a total of three years for one of them to admit it (Probably would have taken eight if Feline and Serval hadn't intervened). The two had been lovelorn for each other for a while. Perhaps not as love at first sight as the others were but it was clear the two were close and in their situation, their love was the complete and total opposite of Leo and Bengal's which consisted of a lot of heavy flirting (On Leo's part) and some serious seduction (Surprisingly on Bengal's part). No, Auberon and Puma were the kind of couple that would blush every time they made eye contact and it probably took them months before they were able to hold hands without blushing profusely.
Finally she turned her eyes onto Feline and Rowel. now these two were special. Fawn had never really known if those two would end up with anyone. She definitely didn't think the two of them would end up together, that was for sure. For months people thought that Feline had a thing for Lynx. Then shortly after people thought he had a thing for Serval. As for Rowel, no one was ever sure of if he would ever like anyone. He wasn't an anti-romantic the way Feline was. He was just a savage and a good one too. He never cried, never got angry, was a little passive aggressive when he was annoyed and he definitely found mushy romance, like the relationship between Auberon and Puma, gag worthy.
Now, two years later, just looking at them Fawn knew that the two of them were either secretly in a relationship or on the bloody top doorstep of becoming an item. It was clear that they were made for each other in how neither really cared for the mushy stuff and both had a savage, sarcastic side. Feline was also never the one that seemed to get offended by Rowel's savage comments and Rowel seemed to find Feline's drama queen side rather amusing. Now, sitting across from them watching the way Feline immediately went on the protective when Rowel showed his abdomen scar, inching closer to the younger boy, and then promptly pulling the boy's shirt down when everyone had a look, the way Rowel would flash Feline a fond gummy smile which would bring the faintest but brightest of smiles to Feline's face, Fawn knew that the two of them were safe in each other's hands.
"You know what I don't understand," Thomas's voice caught Fawn's attention. "Is how come Janson knew that Fawn was with us but did not seem the slightest bit interested in finding out where she was when they attacked the camp."
"That was worrying me as well," Auberon admitted, instantly his leader side shining. "I had Capri and Pisce put up the shields on the carriers just in case we got ambushed on our way back to headquarters."
All of a sudden the carrier they were in shook and no one had to look down to know that they were flying over a Wicked compound and of course Wicked had launched it's land canons to attempt to shoot down the carrier.
"Aw shit!" a raspy voice howled from the cockpit followed promptly by a deeper voice scolding.
"CAPRI! Language!"
Fawn chuckled. "I'm guessing Gemini has 'accidentally' taught Capri some new words?"
"NOT INTENTIONALLY!" the deep voice hollered from the cockpit.
"You think Capri is bad? Wait until you get into a heated argument with Libra!" Feline chuckled.
Everyone besides Fawn and the snipers in the carrier raised their eyebrows in confusion. "Capri? Gemini? Libra?" Frypan asked. "Aren't those constellations or something?"
Lynx chuckled. "Spoiler alert, my name is actually not Lynx. We didnt just happen to all be named after cats. They are code names we chose when we entered Thorn. Sniper's specifically chose cat names or words associated with cats as code names."
Puma nodded his head, hair bouncing. "Trust me, some of the code names Thorn has are so outrageous it is obvious that they aren't our real names."
"Like what?" Frypan asked, probably thinking of a code name for himself already.
"Well Snipers (Red Rose) are cats, Assassins (Black Rose) are names associated with weaponry, Thieves are named after masterminds from history like Socrates. Blue Rose are named after literally different shades of blue. Grenades are the only ones whose code names are their actual names."
"Who would name their children after constellations?" Newt asked, confused.
Everyone was silent in the carrier before Fawn raised her hand, "I named them."
"You?" Several voices choked all at once.
"How come you named them?" Thomas asked. "What about their parents?"
Fawn seemed a little uncomfortable in the way Thomas seemed to be talking down to her in a condescending tone so Auberon stepped forward.
"Fawn is their parent.... or rather their creator. Grenades (White Rose) aren't mortal humans. They were the first ever robotic mentality.... they were the prototypes that would one day be used by Wicked to create Grievers. Grenades are robots."
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You Chapter 7
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Chapter 7
“When was the last time you felt the baby move?” Mary asked as she gently felt Fawn’s abdomen that was not as flat as it used to be, very gradually expanding ever so slightly to the point where Fawn didn’t look like she had been practically starved the past week or so.
“This morning,” Fawn told her. “The baby is always moving, day and night in all directions, all the places. Sometimes it feels strong and demanding, other times it is just feather like touches.”
Mary nodded in satisfaction as she sat back down, and Fawn returned to her spot sitting on one of the cots in the medic tent.
“Well, the baby is apparently healthy and happy. You probably got sick for a few reasons. One of them could be you could just be having later morning sickness which is normal for some people. Another reason could be that because you haven’t eaten in a while your body is just so depleted because it is sending the nutrients you do have to the baby that your stomach just got upset from the lack of food.”
Fawn nodded, agreeing with the woman’s statement.
“From what you have told me and from what I can see and hear, everything is going great and there is nothing to be worried about as far as the baby goes. Just keep doing whatever it is you are doing. When it gets closer to your third trimester and the infant’s birth it will be a good idea to make sure you are at one of the Thorn facilities because should anything happen, trauma, shock or even just the baby positioning the wrong way, they would be better equipped to fix the situation without putting you or the infant at risk.”
“That was the plan,” Fawn admitted.
Mary smiled as she gathered her things. “Well, I’m going to check on Brenda. I’ll leave you two to yourselves. The rest of your friends are still in the food tent I believe. You should join them and try to eat more frequent, small meals. That might cut back on the indigestion.”
Fawn thanked the female doctor as the woman left before she turned to look at Newt who had been standing at the corner of the tent the whole time, arms crossed, chewing on one thumb anxiously, leaning against one of the tent poles for support.
“You heard what she said. The baby is fine,” Fawn told him with a smile.
Newt sighed in relief as he came and sat down beside her on the cot. “I know that. Even in a perfect world I would still be anxious and worried about you and our baby but…. This is far from being anywhere near a perfect world Fawn. This is a world where we are hunted, we starve, we run, we get shot at. That only amplifies the worry and anxiety I feel because you are not the average mother who only has to worry about the usual concerns such as miscarrying the baby, eating properly and the birth. You have to worry about having a price on your head and living in a constant war.”
“I know that,” Fawn assured him as she leant her head against his shoulder and wrapped her arms around his waist. “But look at it this way. We managed to escape the maze, fight off grievers, get taken by Wicked, escape Wicked, travel through the desert for days, get attacked by Wicked again and then make a long trek up a mountain. And yet, somehow, I came out unscathed on the other side with little Bubbles safe and sound.”
Newt raised an eyebrow in amusement, “Bubbles? So you are nicknaming our child after an ingredient in the cure of the Flare that you happened to forget?”
Fawn shifted sheepishly. “Hey, I have a good excuse for forgetting! First of all I never knew the real name and secondly, I was brainwashed and there are still a few grey areas I haven’t gotten back yet.”
Newt chuckled as he pulled the girl to lean back against his front while he rested against the head of the cot. “I know, I’m just teasing you. Can I ask you something?”
Fawn hummed.
“Do you miss Drake?”
The girl was silent for a moment and Newt felt an icy hand of guilt clutch his heart before he heard the girl reply. “I do. Very much. I don’t know if he was killed by cranks, died in the desert, was found by Wicked…. Or somehow, he escaped. The latter being very unlikely. I just try to think that wherever he is, I hope it is a better place than where we are.”
Newt nodded, satisfied with that answer before he kissed the top of Fawn’s head. “Have you thought about names?”
Fawn tilted her head up to look at Newt. “You mean for the baby?”
“Yeah,” Newt replied. “I mean, I know you are very early in the pregnancy but, we cannot call the baby Bubbles.”
Fawn chuckled. “I haven’t really had time to think about names, you know with the whole being hunted and stuff. What are you thinking?”
“I always thought it was so cool that your name is based off of an animal,” Newt admitted. “I mean, i have no idea where my name came from. But your name has a meaning, a symbol.”
“So should we name our child Dog?” Fawn asked, grinning mischievously when Newt poked her ribs playfully.
“No! I mean something unique but pretty,” Newt explained. “Like…. Raven.”
Fawn hummed, “Raven, as in the bird?”
Newt nodded. “Though now that I think about it, Raven is more of a girl’s name than a boy’s name.”
“Well, we have the girl’s name down, what would be your choice of a boy’s name?” Fawn prompted, rather invested in this new conversation.
“Would you consider Robin to be a girl’s name too?” Newt asked.
“Not necessarily,” Fawn replied after some contemplation. “Robin is kind of a unisex name. I guess Raven could be as well, but Raven leans a little more towards a female name.”
As Newt hummed, Fawn felt the vibration through her body and smiled when she felt the baby kick at the familiar sound of its father. “So, we have a boy and a girl’s name prepared, regardless of what the baby turns out to be.”
“Should we also think of a name for a goat? Just in case?” Newt asked and promptly winced when Fawn swatted him over the head. “I was just joking!”
***********
“Seriously Frypan if you are waking me up in the middle of the night because you are having nightmares…” Fawn awoke to the sound of Minho scolding Frypan.
“No Minho you need to get up!” Frypan’s voice was urgent, “Wicked has found us! Their choppers are coming in!”
Fawn scrambled to her feet, about ready to rush out with the others only for Minho and Newt to turn to her at the same time, fingers pointed. “No! You stay here!”
Fawn stuck out her bottom lip in a pout as they boys rushed out of the tent. However, she didn’t try to follow them because she knew they were right. For the average person, only an idiot would bother getting close to Wicked especially since you cannot trust the people who are over the top trigger happy. But put the regular average risk of getting hurt plus the fact that Fawn was protecting not only herself but her and Newt’s child, that was more than enough reason to trust the boys.
She looked around the tent, knowing that they would need to evacuate whether it was immediately or in the morning. Grabbing her bag which she hadn’t even emptied, she threw in a few extra clothes, two extra thermoses, and a canteen of food that was on the table.
She had barely slipped the bag onto her back when she heard a gunshot, and her blood ran cold. She knew without a doubt that the gun fired was a Wicked weapon. She would know that sound anywhere. Someone was down.
She raced through the tent, trying to locate her bow only for a flash of red light to cause her to stop. They were throwing bombs now. Peachy! That was the moment when she recalled where she had left her bow.
Rushing out of the tent, she saw the sky alight with bombs and gunfire, people running in all different directions and weapons firing without rhyme or reason, just firing at anything that moved.
The girl ducked and wove through the hellfire as she made her way to the med tent. However, just as she was about to enter, the small tent was engulfed in flames before a bomb dropped neatly right on top of it, destroying all things within.
“Aw man!” The girl sighed. “I liked that bow!”
“FAWN!” Newt’s unforgettable voice howled as he rushed through the hellfire until he was at Fawn’s side. “I thought I told you to stay inside!”
The girl in question glanced over her shoulder at the tent she had been in not a few moments prior, the place now in flames and demolished. She looked back at her boyfriend who shrugged.
“Okay your survival instinct is stronger than mine but we need to get out of here fast.”
“Who got shot?” Fawn demanded.
Newt’s shoulders sagged. “Mary.”
Fawn felt her heart sink in sadness at the news until she saw Thomas, Brenda, Harriet, and Frypan stumble over towards them, faces sheet white and Thomas looking furious.
The girl sighed, tilting her head as if listening to something far off. “Teresa.”
All eyes turned to her when she mentioned the other girl’s name.
“Teresa turned on us, didn’t she?”
Thomas’s eyes widened, “How did you know!?”
Fawn snorted in exasperation. “Seriously Thomas? Did you really think that the bitch didn’t get her memories back when all of a sudden, she knows her name within seconds of being in the maze, plus knowing the name of someone else? Yeah, you gradually got some of your memories back in dreams but after days of being in the maze. She knew her name within seconds, and she was able to recognize you. Did you really think she even had her memories erased?”
Thomas took a few steps back as if someone had smacked him. “Wh…. what are you talking about?”
“You little….” Fawn spat, her anger showing in the way she was trying to hold back yelling at the boy. “You were so blinded by your little infatuation of the girl that you didn’t realize that she was a spy planted in the maze! Yeah, it was kind of ironic that you ended up in the maze and helped us get out but it is too much of a coincidence that Wicked would put two of their past minions in the same maze with just enough memories to know how to escape a maze plus knowing how to inject someone with a cure serum!”
Frypan gasped, “You mean…. Teresa only knew how to cure Alby…” “Because she bloody was sent there to do it! That was Wicked’s way of making sure that she earned our trust.” Fawns snapped.
Thomas frowned, “But you obviously didn’t trust her if you have suspected her this long.”
“Oh Thomas,” Fawn sighed. “You think because you had some of your memories and that you once worked for Wicked that you are so high and mighty and so much more well informed than the rest of us don’t you? You see us as just other pieces in the big game that Wicked is playing.”
“That is not true!” Thomas went to object, but Fawn wasn’t done.
“Then how come you have been chatting up Teresa every single night, making sure that we are all dead asleep before you do?” Fawn growled. “I am a thief Greenie. I am an assassin, an analyst, a strategist. I am not an idiot like you think the rest of us are! At first I let it slide because I knew you felt more comfortable with Teresa since she had more memories than the rest of us and you also had a puppy dog crush on her but the moment you referred to Newt as a hinderance because of his limp, Winston stupid for not noticing the ventilation shaft underneath his bed at the Wicked compound…... that is when we got some issues Thomas.”
All eyes snapped to Thomas, wide and confused. The boy obviously had not expected to get caught and his face went so white that they could see it in the dark.
“I know you are stressed and confused because of what your mind is trying to remember but never and I mean NEVER underestimate other people just because you think you know more than they do. Want to know how I knew how to cure people from the Flare? Want to know how come I was able to avoid getting stabbed by a Griever despite being slower than the rest of you on top of being pregnant? Want to know how I knew that Teresa was a sly spy of a bitch who was going to get Minho, Aris, and Sonya captured? It’s because that was my plan!”
Everyone frowned, totally confused as to what the girl was talking about however Fawn noticed Harriet grasp her gun tighter, probably waiting for Fawn to turn into a traitor like Teresa. However, that was the moment Grace decided to reveal that she had been hiding in the shadows.
“Grievers were not designed by Wicked. They were designed by Thorn,” the girl explained. “They were designed to take the form of dragons, dogs, elephants and other large animals that could be utilized to help people in their day-to-day work as well as protection. However, a member of Thorn was taken prisoner and brainwashed and sent to the maze but not before their brains were literally read and Wicked found out the blueprints and the formula to create the robotic creatures and used it to create Grievers.” Grace explained. “Fawn was the architect. Just like how Fawn knew about the cure for the Flare even before she was brainwashed, she also knew about the existence and the mechanics of Grievers.”
“Wait…. What did you mean about knowing that Teresa was going to turn traitor and get Minho, Sonya and Aris captured?” Brenda asked.
Grace looked over at Fawn, giving the reins back over to her. “When Grace told you that I was being monitored by Seven Snipers, she wasn’t lying. What she didn’t know was that I have tasked those seven snipers with different tasks rather than protecting me. Three of them were tasked with monitoring Teresa at every single hair of a breath she took. They sent me updates and confirmed my suspicions. I knew that Teresa had informed Wicked of our location.” “Then why didn’t you warn us!? We could have left!?” Frypan whined.
“Not enough time,” Newt confirmed. “By the time we got everyone to believe her and get us out, Wicked would have arrived and Teresa could have just told them the new location.”
“Exactly,” Fawn confirmed. “I knew we had to be found by Wicked to escape… but it wasn’t the plan for Frypan, Sonya, and Aris to be taken. The other four snipers assigned to me kept tabs on the troops that arrived tonight. Based on who came tonight, I knew that there was a chance only 2 or 3 hostages could be taken on top of Teresa leaving. The plan was to have 3 of the snipers take the place of the hostages, pretending to be kids from the maze. By being inside the facility they could easily find out ways to bring them down from the inside.”
“So, the plan was for someone to be taken…. just not Minho, Aris, and Sonya,” Harriet sighed. “But where are your Sniper friends now? How come they failed?”
“We did not plan on Mary getting shot,” Fawn explained. “Nor were we planning on Janson being there. He had not been in the original transport that the Snipers observed. Because of his presence, we knew that if the snipers were taken instead of us, Janson would know that they weren’t from the maze with us.”
“Damn it,” Newt muttered. “But where are the Snipers?”
Just as he asked, a loud ringing sound met their ears and the hellfire stopped abruptly. They all looked up to see the sky that had been glowing red with fire and flame now turn to a white glow as large balls of gunfire, practically glowing white flew and took out a whole helicopter in one go. The armed Wicked foot soldiers that were on the ground immediately turned their sights elsewhere when they saw the large black helicopter, elegant and long in shape come to hover above them.
“White Rose,” Newt muttered when he saw the white design of a rose on the belly of the aircraft. “Grenades….”
“Aw crap,” Grace huffed. “Feline snitched.”
Fawn smiled, “And you are surprised? He is a bit of a drama queen.”
“Snitched? To whom?” Thomas asked, face still pale.
“Feline is one of the Snipers,” Grace explained. “One of the best. Whenever something goes sideways, he snitches to the Grenades and has them come in to save the day with their big bombs.”
A second helicopter with the white rose emblem appeared in the sky and began taking out the ground troops one by one, very efficiently and oddly enough, without kicking up dust. These guys were wickedly good with their aim.
“Speak of the devil,” Fawn whispered, and everyone turned to see eight motorcycles come barreling down the hill towards the crowd of remaining Right Arm survivors.
The motorcycles were black, large, and lean shaped but silent, barely making a noise. Etched into the shiny black metal on each motorcycle was a red rose. The Snipers.
One by one the eight snipers removed their helmets, set them on the handlebars before climbing off and approaching Fawn like they were a troop reporting for duty.
The first to approach Fawn was obviously the leader, one of the tallest there with a lean but athletic build.
“Auberon,” Fawn greeted before the boy in question grinned widely and gathered the girl in a hug.
“They are kids…. Just like us,” Thomas whispered to Frypan as if he had not already known that Grace was a Sniper and also a kid.
“Oi! Tsk!” The shortest Sniper hissed at his leader, pushing his broad shoulders through the crowd before pulling Auberon off Fawn. “Let the girl breathe dude!”
“Aw he’s just happy to see her!” a tall, lean boy with a deep voice chirped as he looped an arm around the shorter boy’s shoulders.
Fawn grinned at the two boys, “Serval…. Lynx. Lovely to see you again. My offer still stands you know.”
“No!” Another Sniper objected, his hair an almost rustic orange color. “We are not letting Puma oversee the music at their wedding! We will have PTSD because of the LED lights!”
The boy in question, Puma, looked rather offended by his comrade’s comment and slapped him over the back of the head. “I love you too Leo.”
Two more of the Snipers pushed their way past their pals until they gathered Fawn into a hug. It was clear that the taller, skinnier of the two was not that much into open affection, giving the girl only a quick side hug but it was clear he was happy to see her. The shorter of the two however was like a leech, latching onto the girl with a huge grin and jumping up and down in joy.
“Hello Feline,” Fawn said to the taller boy. “Bengal you are squeezing too much…. Ow ow ow!”
Bengal immediately retracted to allow for the youngest of the group to come greet Fawn. However, before the girl could even give the boy a hug, it was Newt and Frypan who gasped loudly.
“ROWEL!?”
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You chapter 6
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Chapter 6
"BRENDA!" Someone shouted, running into the room and interrupting the two girls' conversation. "Its WICKED. They found us and they are almost here. You need to get the prisoners out. I'll help Fawn get out."
Brenda didn't even argue as she leapt to her feet and bolted from the room. Fawn rose to her feet and met the eyes of the person standing before her. And older woman, probably in her mid thirties to early forties. The woman looked at Fawn with a sad expression before she sighed, opening the door and stepping aside.
"You know the way." She muttered.
Fawn grabbed her bag which she slung over her shoulder and she stepped through the door but paused right when she passed the woman, "Three years ago... The west ridge. You were there when I handed the archives over to HJ."
The woman's eyes widened and her mouth plopped open as if about to speak but her mind seemed to have short circuited, not knowing what to say when a smirk flashed across Fawn's face. "How..."
"You never read what was in the archives did you?" Fawn asked, tilting her head calmly to the side.
The woman shook her head, still flabbergasted.
"Well, that's too bad because only those who read the archives will know the answer to your question." Fawn said with a smile and a wink before she ducked out of the room.
Meanwhile, Newt, Thomas and the others had somehow managed to get themselves unchained from the ceiling and were waiting for the blood to leave their brains when the door opened and they had a gun pointed at their faces.
"Oh you've got to be kidding me," Newt muttered, "Look mate we dont want any trouble we just want to get out of here."
"Is that so?" the man sneered before holding a walkie talkie to his mouth. "Janson, I've got them. I'm bringing them to you. Don't shoot us."
The group mentally rolled their eyes. of course Janson had an inside person. Before they could even think of anything to say in retort, the man froze and the sound of a muffled gunshot met their ears. For a split second they thought that the man had let loose and shot Thomas who was standing right in his line of fire, only for the man to topple over with a gunshot in his head.
The first person they noticed was Brenda only for their eyes to fall on the other person standing next to her.... a girl.... with a bandana tied around her mouth concealing everything but her eyes to her forehead. Her hair was long and black, tied in a high ponytail that fell almost to her waist. She wore a black leather jacket covered in black tassels but embroidered between her shoulder blades was what appeared to be a red rose. Her black pants were form fitting but flared at the ankles, and on each pant leg were red roses embroidered.
"Hurry up!" Brenda called, starting to run in the opposite direction.
The kids promptly ran after her only for Jorge to push open two double doors to reveal a zipline that went across between two buildings, hundreds of feet in the air.
"Oh geez," Frypan muttered.
"It'll be fun," Fawn remarked as she snuck up from behind them. "Definitely not as bad as being chased by grievers."
"FAWN!" the kids all screeched in unison as Newt gathered the girl up in a hug.
"Where have you been?" Newt demanded as he checked the girl over. "are you hurt? did they hurt you?"
"Not at all," Fawn assured him with a grin. "We came to an understanding."
The girl glanced at Brenda over Newt's shoulder and saw the former smiling back at her knowingly.
"Come on!" Jorge encouraged and one by one the kids began to zip across.
When Fawn landed on the other side and Newt caught her to keep her from stumbling, she realized that Brenda and Thomas were still on the other side but they weren't coming across and she couldn't see them.
"You, girl," Jorge said, shoving a piece of paper into Fawn's hands. "Follow these directions. It will lead you to a safe house. I will meet you there with Thomas and Brenda. There are rows of cars on the lower level. Grab one and get out of here."
Fawn didn't question it and snatched the paper before grabbing Newt by the wrist and began to run down the stairs, the others close behind.
***********
"Pst, Fawn," Minho whispered in the girl's ear. "Listen girl I know you're carrying around Newt's offspring and I am sure that is exhausting but you need to wake up. We're here."
The girl groaned as she rose to a sitting position, rubbing her eyes. She found that she had fallen asleep on Newt's shoulder and the boy had in turn fallen asleep leaning back against her so she carefully shifted his head so he was resting against her so as to not rouse him.
She peered around the packed jeep. Minho was sitting next to her on the bench, Frypan next to Minho with a half conscious Thomas and Teresa sitting on the floor of the jeep. Brenda was sitting in the front passenger seat with Jorge who was driving.
Leaning as much as she could, Fawn saw that they were approaching a dusty, desolate canyon. From the way it looked, they were going to be taking the mountain road across the canyon which was a narrow strip of jutted rock that went up between the steep incline.
"Minho would you be so kind as to get your foot out of my ass?" Frypan complained as he stuck his head out of the window.
"We need to stop here as it is," Jorge complained as he groaned, pulling the jeep to a stop. "There are vehicles blocking the way."
Instantly Fawn perked up. Vehicles? If there are vehicles in the mountains then they must be close. After rousing Thomas and Newt from their slumber, the kids climbed out of the jeep and began to slowly follow Jorge and Brenda further up the path. They were cautious as they continued, constantly eyeing around themselves to watch for anyone who might spring out of nowhere. The silence however was short lived when suddenly someone started firing at them and they found themselves ducking behind the blockage of vehicles for coverage.
"I think we found them!" Newt yelled over the rain of fire.
"Ya think!?" Minho shouted back. "What do we do?"
Newt looked around, about to ask Fawn only to find that she was gone. He quickly perked up, quickly trying to peer around the cars for where the girl was only to realize that the firing had stopped.
"Hands up and keep them up!" a girl's voice shouted, rather close.
The boy slowly got up, hands raised so high they thought they would pop their shoulders out of socket. That was when they saw where Fawn was. Standing out in the open, hands raised calmly and beside her, was the masked girl.
Two girls, probably the same age as the rest of them, approached wearing heavy armor and weapons and masks covering their faces.
"Hands up!" the two girls repeated, pointing their rifles in the boys' faces as they slowly made their way to stand beside Fawn and the other girl.
"What did you think you were doing?" Minho hissed at Fawn.
The girl smiled. "Call it instinct."
Minho gave the girl a placid look. "Instinct is one day going to get you shot!"
Fawn just smiled at her best friend as Frypan, Aris and the others inched forwards with their hands in the air and faces as white as snow.
It was one of the masked girls with a rifle that broke the silence, "Aris?"
The boy in question took an extra step forward as the girl tore down her mask.
"Oh my gosh Harriet!?" the boy gasped as he was gathered into a hug by the two girls.
"We thought you were dead you big idiot!" the other girl, a blond chuckled.
Jorge was the one who poked his head forward. "I am guessing you know each other?"
Aris chuckled, "We were in the maze together!"
"Who are all these people Aris?" the blond asked, looking around.
"These are my friends, we met when we were taken by Wicked and we all escaped together." Aris explained.
Harriet however had her eyes glued on the girl dressed all in black, her mask still up. "And this?"
All eyes turned to the girl in question, everyone equally curious about the answer to that question as well.
Brenda and Fawn both stepped forward to stand on either side of the girl as support but the girl held up a hand to stop them. Reaching up, she untied the bandana around her face and pulled it off. She was a beautiful girl with an oval face, tanned skin and big eyes like a tiny deer.
"My name is Grace," the girl said, revealing that her voice was very soft, almost like a whisper a little husky as if she had just woken up. "I was sent to ensure that my charge arrived here safely."
"Your charge?" Harriet, Thomas and Teresa all said at once.
The girl smiled and turned to Fawn who was calmly listening to the girl. "Fawn. She is my charge."
All eyes turned to Fawn, only to find that the girl did not look surprised at all.
"Fawn?" Newt whispered. "Is this true?"
The girl in question smiled and nodded. "I met Grace a year before Wicked brainwashed me. Some of my very clear memories have started coming back and one of them was Grace. She was just a trainee when I was taken but I had the honor of training her in self defense for a short time before I was taken. The division I worked and trained for, specifically assigned someone they call a Sniper to follow and keep tabs on the occupants of one specific maze. For example, the maze that Aris and Harriet were kept in, ever since they escaped the maze they have been watched over by a Sniper. The same goes for everyone from our maze, but it is a different Sniper for every maze. One other protocol is that if a Sniper is taken by Wicked, one Sniper will be tasked to follow that Sniper everywhere until the taken Sniper is returned safely to the division."
"So, Grace is the sniper that was tasked with getting you back safely?" Minho asked, trying to piece everything together. "How come we didn't notice her following us?"
The two girls fell silent and it was Grace who finally spoke. "When Fawn was taken by Wicked, I made sure that I was able to infiltrate the maze and follow her in, but I couldn't do it myself because rule number one of a Sniper following a Sniper, the second sniper cannot also get captured no matter what. So I sent someone else in to follow Fawn while she was in the maze and until I could get to her without getting caught myself. It wasn't until you were all in the dessert that my confidant, the one I sent to protect Fawn was erased from the equation."
Everyone frowned, confused as to the vague answer Grace was giving. It was Fawn who finally spoke.
"Drake."
"Oh shit," Thomas whispered. "So it wasnt an accident Drake ended up in the maze?"
Both girls shook their heads, "I snuck Drake inside and he followed Fawn," Grace explained. "I placed a chip in his collar that allowed me to receive any messages that Fawn left with him. I got my first message from Fawn the night before you all ventured out of the maze together. That was when I knew she had gotten some of her memories back. However, my connection with Drake was broken in the dessert.... when Drake went missing. That was why I appeared at the compound under Brenda's permission."
Jorge and everyone else turned to look at Brenda who sighed. "Okay I know about Snipers okay? Before I met any of you, when I was just a kid, I was rescued from Wicked by a Sniper. I recognized the symbol on Grace's jacket when she arrived and I knew she was following her charge."
"The red rose," Thomas muttered. "Wait.... you aren't connected to the white rose are you?"
Grace did not reply and Thomas was about to repeat himself when Minho spoke, "Wait Thomas.... I think she is deaf."
Newt took a step forward and looked Grace in the face. The girl turned to him, slightly confused as to why she was the center of attention. "How in the world did you notice that?"
"She never replied to anything that occurred behind her and she was always looking at whoever was talking," Minho replied, his ears going slightly red when Fawn gave him a grin at his awareness.
"Grace lost her hearing as a child," Fawn explained. "She is the reason I was able to function without my sight for a while because she has a strong sense of spacial awareness. Just make sure she is looking at you when you speak and she can lip read."
Thomas tried and repeated his question and Grace smiled. "The White Rose is not a people. They are just a division. They are a division of Thorn. There are the White Rose, the Red Rose, Blue Rose, Green Rose, and Black Rose. Those are the five divisions of Thorn."
"What is the difference?" Jorge asked, suddenly intrigued by all this storytelling he was receiving.
"Simply put," Grace explained. "Red Rose, the division I work for are Snipers. We are tasked with protecting people without being noticed. Kind of like elite bodyguards so to speak. Black Rose are literally what their division calls them: Assassins. They go out with one or two missions at a time to basically get rid of people who are either well known criminals, putting members of Thorn at risk or are people of Wicked who need to be erased. They are only brought out in dire situations such as if one of our people are kidnapped and being tortured, or if any of our people or victims of Wicked were killed or murdered by Wicked, they would go and blow up a Wicked warehouse after Blue Rose went in and got everyone out. Blue Rose are known as Rangers. They are tasked with evacuation, clearing people out of places, rescuing people who are taken. They do not specialize in following their target and protecting them like Snipers are. If it ever got a to point where I could never get Fawn out by my own means, I would have had to call in a Ranger and they would have removed Fawn from Wicked. Green Rose are the chameleons. No one ever sees them but they infiltrate facilities and steal materials, supplies, and information without being detected. They are the Thieves of Thorn."
"And White Rose?" Minho asked.
"Oh I know White Rose!" Harriet spoke up. "White Rose is actually our neighbors and we have met some of them before. Very friendly."
Grace nodded and turned to Fawn for the girl to finish.
"White Rose is the attack force. They do not sneak in like the assassins, they dont evacuate like the Rangers, nor do they protect and shadow like the Snipers. White Rose members are known as Grenades. They defend Thorn, they defend the members of Thorn, and when need be they go into war with Wicked to save those of Thorn."
"Wait.... so if Grace was tasked with protecting you.... you must be a member of White Rose...." Frypan pointed out.
"Isn't that obvious?" Thomas asked, swatting the boys' head. "The big question is, what division were you in?"
"Oh Fawn? No I wasnt the only one who was supposed to protect Fawn," Grace interrupted. "There are actually seven other Snipers who have been working on protecting Fawn. That is why I was so confident in sending in a dog to protect Fawn."
"Seven!?" Teresa squeaked, obviously not expecting that. "Why seven?"
Grace grinned from ear to ear as she looped an arm around Fawn's shoulders. "Oh Fawn here is special so it required all the best of our team to make sure she made it out alive. You see, Fawn isn't in the normal five divisions of Thorn. She is the sole and only member of Golden Rose. Golden Rose is not only a Sniper, Thief, Ranger, Bomber, and Assassin, she is also Officer and Pilot."
"Officer and Pilot?"
Fawn sighed. "Officer is the strategist, planner, and navigator.... and Pilot.... is the founder."
*********
“Vince is going to be happy to see you guys,” Harriet babbled on as they made their way up the sandy, rocky incline towards what looked like a makeshift camp.
The place was obviously new, or at least temporary because the only thing that seemed to have been there longer than a week were the rocks. Multiple cloth tents were put up in random order, supplies and such forth laying around between the tents, obviously not concerned about the appearance of the camp.
“So, this is the Right Arm,” Newt muttered just loud enough for Fawn to hear. “Definitely not what I expected.”
“What did you expect?” Minho asked. “All anyone has said was that they were people living in the mountains. This is as close to ‘people living in the mountains’ as you can get.”
Newt shrugged, “I don’t know. The way everyone talked about them as if they were ghosts, I always thought that they would be like superheroes….”
Fawn smiled, trying to hold down a snicker at Newt’s very exaggerated sense of imagination, though she couldn’t deny it was one of the things that made her fall for him.
“Is the Thorn this boring?” Frypan whispered back, obviously in the same dramatic boat as Newt.
Fawn smiled. “It has been a few hefty years since I last saw any members of the Thorn besides Grace. Though from what I recall, we did have uniforms we wore and while we were on the move constantly, we did have permanent bases that were well built and fortified.”
“Well at least that is some kind of improvement from this,” Frypan decided, shrugging as they continued their trek.
They finally arrived at the campsite and were soon met by…. Essentially the whole camp which consisted of only about 20-30 people. A man, who was obviously the leader Vince, approached. His shaggy blond hair, beard and tired eyes told Fawn that this man was sleep deprived, constantly worrying and stressing, and in dire need of some self-care.
“Who are these people?” the man asked of Harriet.
“This is Aris,” Harriet explained. “He was in the maze with us and these are some others who escaped the maze and Wicked.”
Vince eyed the group cautiously before he turned to look at Jorge, “And what about you?”
“He was part of an undercover organization hiding from Wicked,” Newt immediately stepped in, not wanting a fight to break out between adults. “He was helping us before Wicked bombed their hideout.”
Vince glanced between Newt and Jorge before he shrugged, obviously content with that response. His eyes had almost landed on Grace and Fawn when suddenly Brenda slumped to the ground, dead weight.
“BRENDA!” Jorge howled as he rushed to her side.
Instantly Thomas and Newt rushed to help as well only to see the girl panting heavily, eyes closed and sweat dripping off her body in buckets.
“What is wrong with her?” Vince asked, unmoved by the girl obviously fainting.
“I don’t know,” Jorge whined in distress. “She must have just been tired…. I didn’t think she was wounded…”
Before the poor man could continue, Vince walked forward and grabbing Brenda’s pant leg, pulled it up to reveal a big purple and black infection growing on her leg. He immediately recoiled and pulled out his gun.
“Crank. Crank! We have a Crank here!”
Jorge immediately pulled out his own gun and Thomas was about to do something stupid again and put his forehead to Vince’s gun when Jorge’s voice rang out.
“She is not a crank! She is just infected! She will recover.”
“Yeah? Before she starts eating and attacking everyone within reach?” Vince yelled back. “There is no goddamn cure for this!”
Jorge opened his mouth to retort, and Thomas was still trying to push against Newt who was the only one keeping him from getting in the line of fire. However, everyone fell silent when a female’s voice spoke up.
“On any other given day, I would agree with you Vince, but today you are outnumbered.”
All eyes turned to see a woman probably in her early forties stepping forward. She did not look as rundown and exhausted as Vince though it was clear she worked just as hard, if not harder than he did. She was just better at taking care of herself. Her eyes were glued on Thomas before they scanned the group of kids and landed on Fawn.
“Not only do we have Thomas here, but also a Sniper…. And the one person I never thought I would get to meet in person.”
At first everyone looked at Thomas in confusion, not sure as to how this woman knew Thomas by name and obviously knew him a little bit more than that. However, at that moment Grace stepped to the front of the group, practically ushering Fawn forward. That was what made Vince and his men lower their weapons, eyes shocked and faces stunned.
“Fawn Jones,” Vince observed once he regained his composure, “Well I’ll be. Who thought you would be standing here dressed like a child. I have heard many stories about your…. Skills, and “adventures”. I wonder just how many of them are true.”
“I am guessing Fawn is a bit of a celebrity,” Fawn could hear Minho whisper to Thomas who had finally stopped trying to be a martyr.
Newt stepped forward, hand hovering around Fawn’s waist, ready to pounce if anyone posed any threat to the girl. “How did you know who Fawn was?”
The woman smiled. “Fawn Jones better known as the Golden Thorn has been a center figure of the rebellion against Wicked for the better half of a decade. It has been almost six years since rumors, stories began to be passed around mouth to ear, person to person of a young girl with a longbow of fire that matched the sunset color of her hair, dressed all in black save for the single golden rose embroidered on her shoulder. The stories told of her infiltrating Wicked compounds, attacking transports of kidnapped children, and setting them free. The stories began to grow as more and more people flocked to the lone freedom fighter and began to join her cause. One by one, each branch of the Thorn was created and as it grew, so did other rebellions. Vince won’t tell you this, but I will. His little brother was taken by Wicked but somehow his brother’s best friend, Feline, had managed to escape and joined Fawn’s cause as a Red Rose Sniper. Almost everyone you meet who has escaped Wicked or is here hiding from them have had an encounter with the Thorn and it was all thanks to the stubborn, fire headed girl who started it all.”
“What did you mean when you said Vince was outnumbered?” Thomas asked, still perplexed.
“Because I used to work with you Thomas. Before Wicked threw me out because I was beginning to not trust their methods. I know your potential and I know that you know some of what Fawn does.”
Everyone tilted their head in confusion.
“I do not suppose you have heard of the Archives that were stolen from Wicked a few years back…. Just a few months before Fawn Jones was taken.”
“We heard of it but…. Fawn doesn’t remember what was in the files,” Minho explained.
The woman turned to look at Vince and nodded at Brenda, “Take her to the med tent. I will come and treat her. Keep your gun away from her Vince.”
The man grumbled but he obeyed, Jorge following close behind as the woman ushered the kids to another tent where a table and chairs were set up.
“I see you have forgone sharing all the details with your friends,” the woman said as she sat down, giving Fawn a knowing look.
Newt leant across the table to look his girlfriend dead in the eye, “Fawn? Did you regain your memories?”
Fawn sighed. “When Drake was taken, they started flooding in a lot faster than they had been. I had recovered all my memories by the time Jorge intercepted us…. Except for a very short period right before I was taken by Wicked. Those memories didn’t come back until yesterday.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Thomas demanded, “Obviously these archives that you stole from Wicked are vitally important to both sides. What was in them?”
“Confirmation that what my research had suspected was actually true,” Fawn explained. “When children were beginning to disappear, kidnapped, and taken to Wicked, we began to learn more and more about the flare and about the effect it had on humans. We knew it could be passed via wounds or even through just breathing the same air as a crank. As the Thorn, we continued to keep close tabs on the kids in the maze and we noticed which kids were immune and which ones weren’t. I was afraid that I was going to start losing you guys…. The people I knew before Wicked, so I took it upon myself to check on the people I knew who were in the maze. The people who were immune…. And the ones who weren’t, surprised me.”
Thomas frowned in complete complexity, but Fawn saw that Newt and Minho were catching on. “You found a pattern.”
Fawn nodded. “A pattern in who turned out to be immune and not immune. I had a few suspicions of what could have been the cause. So, I did the one thing that could have gotten me fired if I was not already my own boss. I leaked my suspicions to Wicked under the guise of a field doctor who was studying the flare. Wicked performed the tests and data checks that I couldn’t do with my limited resources, and they confirmed my suspicions. However instead of using the information that I had practically placed in their laps, they decided to not use it, even though it would have put an end to all the deaths from the flare, the cranks multiplying and eliminate the need to keep kids in the maze.”
“Then why didn’t they use it?” Minho growled. “They had a bloody cure!”
“Wicked found out that if people believed there was no cure and that they only people who could find a cure were Wicked, then people would flock to them for help. It was a power move. A move to keep the world under their control, in the palm of their hands.” Grace explained with a sad face. “That is how the Green Rose Thieves were born. Fawn infiltrated Wicked and stole back the data that Wicked had collected on her research and escaped with it. She entrusted it to the Black Rose Assassins who have kept it safe since then.”
All eyes then turned to the female doctor who had been listening intently. “If you had the cure, why haven’t you used it yet?”
“There was just one problem with that,” the woman explained. “By the time we got the archives, Fawn had been taken by Wicked and brainwashed. There was a specific ingredient that was the core of the cure. However, the name that Fawn sent to Wicked and the name of the ingredient that was in the archives…. Does not exist.”
“HUH!?” Thomas whined.
Fawn sighed. “Long story short, I failed. Before I was brainwashed, I knew what the ingredient looked like and where to find it. However, I only knew what it had been called by myself. You know how as a child you give things nicknames because you either want to or you cannot pronounce the real name? Well, I gave the specific ingredient a nickname: Bubbles. I sent a sample of the ingredient to Wicked when I leaked my research to them. When I stole the archives and sent them to the Assassins, I didn’t realize that Wicked had destroyed the Bubbles sample and had forgone inputting the ingredient’s real name. I believe they had begun to suspect that their lucky information had not been exactly pure luck. The next time I heard anything about the archives was when Grace sent me a message via Drake the day before we went into the maze, telling me that the archives were essentially useless because only I knew what the ingredient’s real name was.”
“But that is the one part of your memory you don’t have back?” Minho asked.
“Not really…. The thing was, I never learnt the ingredient’s real name. I only know what I used to call it by… and what it looked like. So, the only way I could possibly find the ingredient is if by some miracle I saw a sketch, or picture of Bubbles and was able to recognize it.”
“So we are in a stalemate,” Thomas groaned.
“Not necessarily,” the female nurse observed. “Thomas, would you follow me?”
The woman had just gotten to her feet when the sound of someone either gagging or retching caused everyone to turn to see Fawn doubled over, a hand over her abdomen and the other to her mouth as if she was coughing really bad.
“Fawn!” Newt and Minho shouted in unison, leaping to their feet but Grace beat them to it, holding up a hand to stop them from approaching further and she carefully approached Fawn.
“You okay?” she asked calmly.
Fawn nodded, “I just feel sick to my stomach. Not eating the last two days probably didn’t help.”
“Well come on then!” Minho and Newt chirped, rushing forward to grasp the girl underneath both arm and practically carried her like an infant through the camp after Grace who led the way to the meal tent.
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You Chapter 5
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Chapter 5
Fawn woke to warmth enveloping her from all sides.
Not the painful hot warmth you have to run through when running from a murderous facility for your life through the desert.
Not this was the yummy type of warmth that envelopes you like a hug, sooths you when you ache and strokes you when you are anxious.
The girl cracked her eyes open, despite the urge to keep sleeping and she saw that the sun was beginning to rise, showing that the trench they had taken refuge in the night before offered shade from the heat and wind.
As she stirred, something rubbed her belly and she looked down to see the familiar hand that belonged to Newt resting on her abdomen, fingers splayed out as if protecting their baby within.
Fawn slowly turned her neck to look at Newt.
He was sleeping partly sitting up leaning against the sand dune with his one hand on her belly and the other tangled in her hair, having fallen asleep while stroking her hair.
He looked so young and innocent when he slept… almost too young to be a father and definitely too young to be experiencing such pain and misery.
The girl smiled. They might be very young, younger than most people usually are when they become pregnant with their first child but life happens.
Love takes hold and you give yourself entirely over to the person you love and the product of love is always a child in some form or another.
Fawn had been surprised to say the least when she had recognized all of her symptoms as those of pregnancy but honestly, a part of her had been expecting it.
After all, she did sleep with Newt and babies happen when you sleep with people.
If a person was ever shocked out of their pants or thought it was a mistake that they found themselves pregnant, they must either have no clue how the human body works or they are just plain stupid.
Slowly rotating herself so that she was lying chest to chest with Newt, she pressed a kiss to the corner of his lips. The boy shifted in his sleep, making an adorable little mumble as he came to and his big brown eyes opened to the sight of a head full of red curls looking up at him with a smile.
The boy grinned, eyes closing again as he held the girl closer and hummed sleepily but happily.
“I could get used to seeing this every morning.”
Fawn beamed up at him before their sweet moment was forever ruined by Thomas shouting and a raven cawing angrily as the boy in question tried to scare the bird off from their supplies.
“We need to keep moving,” Thomas called, waking the rest of the group.
Giving Newt a smile, Fawn pushed herself off of him and set about gathering her things.
Her face felt incredibly hot…. As if she had been crying and then she remembered... Drake was gone… lost in the hoard of cranks… if he survived that entourage, it would be more of a miracle than seeing Chuck or Gally rise from the dead!
She was just pulling on her backpack when she froze… so did everyone else for they heard it… the deep rumbling of propellors.
“Hide!” Minho and Thomas both cried.
Hands and bodies flew everywhere as the kids grabbed their things and ducked underneath the overhang to hide from the prying search party.
The beating became louder until it was right over them and the sound was so strong that it felt like their bodies were vibrating to the beat!
Gradually the sound faded but no one moved a muscle until the noise was completely gone and their ears had stopped ringing.
“Let’s go,” Thomas said in a whisper as if someone could hear. “Keep an eye out.”
Obeying the plan, the small group headed out and began to walk single file through the sand…. And the blaring gale.
Of all things, why did it have to be wind added to the mix?
Sure the wind made it feel less hot but it kicked up the sand and blew it in their faces.
The gang kept their hands in front of their faces and eyes half lidded to avoid going blind from sand eyes.
The dunes seemed to be getting taller and taller as they went before they came to a halt at the top of one particularly tall dune.
“Can you see that?” Thomas said, pointing to where something seemed to be situated in the distance. “That looks like it might be another place we can take refuge.”
“Hopefully there will be no cranks there.” Minho added.
Fawn took their pause to try and brush sand out of her hair when she heard a thud and the boys rushed forward to a body that had landed in the sand.
“Winston!” Newt yelled.
The boys, knowing that trying to inspect him in the blinding sun and blaring wind would be unwise so they worked together and lifted the boy up before carrying him to a small pile of debris that offered some shade and shelter.
They laid him down and they saw that the boy was sweating and groaning in pain.
Grabbing the hem of his shirt, Winston pulled it up to reveal a terrible rash that had taken over his abdomen.
“it wont stop spreading,” he groaned.
The group froze and some of them took a step back.
They recognized it as the flare that was shown in the old abandoned maze lab.
He must have picked it up when the crank scratched him… the boy’s face that seemed void of all life turned and he looked at Fawn.
“Please. You know what to do.”
Fawn swallowed and was suddenly glad that Thomas and Teresa were talking off in the distance and were unable to hear that.
“what does he mean?” Minho asked. “Fawn?”
the girl swallowed thickly, “I loved it when I got to work with the animals but now I wish I hadn't because I would not have to say the truth it is so painful that it hurts. Damn you Winston!”
The boys seemed confused so the girl explained in a cracking voice and shaky tone.
“the only way to stop a disease when there is no known cure is to cut off the source of life...”
All the boys turned and looked at Winston, realizing what he had planned and what Fawn had meant.
“you need to put me out of my misery.” he croaked.
When none of the boys moved to oblige, the weak boy reached out and snatched up one of the pistols that they had found and put it to his head.
Frypan lunged forward and snatched it away but it fired into the air.
As the large boy wrestled the gun from him, Thomas and Teresa rushed over.
“are you crazy!?” Frypan yelled.
“what is going on?” Thomas yelled back.
“guys,” Fawn snapped. “he is miserable! There is no cure... no way we can fix this! He will become a crank in days at this rate! Is that the fate you want him to endure? To live as a monster? You need to stop the pain...”
The boys froze when they saw the tears appear in Fawn’s eyes.
“it’s the nicest thing to do.” Newt concluded, understanding where Fawn and Winston were coming from.
Gently he took the gun from Frypan and approached Winston. He laid the weapon in his hands gently.
“thank you Newt,” the boy croaked.
The gang slowly turned and began to walk away.
Fawn paused to bend down and press a kiss to the boy's head and Winston spoke.
“I'll say hi to everyone when I get there... and I'll tell Gally that you are still the superior fighter.”
Choking back a sob, the girl followed the others away from the debris and along the sandbanks. When that shot went off, a part of her soul died.
******
Newt never thought the day would come when he felt jealous over something. It was naturally impossible to become jealous or to even feel jealous in the maze.
After all what was there to feel jealous over? The location of your hammock or how clean you were able to get your clothes by scrubbing them to shreds in the pond?
One could even say that jealousy was the furthest thing from their minds while they were in the maze but now, Newt could feel the crippling anger and frustration overwhelming him. He sat at the top of the dune while the rest of the gang were seated nearby, taking a break from the constant walking and trying to squeeze the last remaining drops of water out of their bottles in vain.
He could see Fawn leaning back against the dune to give her aching and sore back a break while her arm was thrown over her eyes to block out the sunlight that was relentless.
Minho sat next to her, shaking his thermos in the hope that some water would magically drip out. He was not feeling angry by the fact that Minho was sitting next to the love of Newt’s life and the mother of his child... but by the fact that Fawn lent her head against Minho shoulder and the boy wrapped his arm around hers and stroked her arm in a comforting manner.
That was when Newt saw the shaking of her shoulders. She was crying and she was turning to Minho for comfort instead of him. Newt ground his teeth.
There were hundreds of other things he could be angry about... the heat and the lack of water... the sand caked in his hair and on his clothes... Teresa’s obnoxious suspicious behavior and Thomas’s infatuation with her... but of all the things he could only think about, all he could concentrate on was the way Fawn was all close and chummy with Minho.
All too soon Thomas was saying that they needed to keep going and they were on the move again. Ignoring the limp in his leg and the sweat pouring down his neck, Newt picked up the pace until he was walking directly behind Fawn in the single file line.
“So what is it with you and Minho?” he asked, his tone harsh and short.
Fawn glanced at him over her shoulder in puzzlement, “what are you talking about?”
“oh nothing just the fact he was all over you earlier, hugging you and petting you like a pet puppy!”
Fawn let out a snort of laughter and stopped her trek to turn and look Newt in the eye.
“don't tell me the calm and collected Newt Sangster was jealous!” she teased.
Newt glared, “this is not funny!”
Fawn sighed as she reached up and wiped the sweat from Newt’s brow before she pressed a kiss to his lips, “let me tell you something. When you have a lot of baggage... a lot of pain worries... you don't want to weigh it all down on one person because then that person would be weighed down as well... so you tend to tell some worries to one person and the other worries to another person. I share everything with you Newt but I also don't want to weigh you down every time I feel down or upset. Minho was just listening to my hormonal pregnant-self cry about Winston and Drake. Minho is like my brother Newt. He is the last person you need to worry about around me.” the girl assured him.
Newt looked down at his feet and embarrassment. Maybe jealousy was not all that it was cracked up to be. Fawn smiled up at him before she kissed his nose and turned to keep walking.
Newt watched her walk off before he hurried up to walk beside her. reaching down he grabbed her hand and kept his eyes facing forward when the girl beamed up at him. Not long after, the sun began to set and the heat went with it. Their pace began to pick up slightly now that they were no longer sweating when Thomas suddenly pulled the group to a stop.
“are those... what I think they are?” He mumbled as the gang gathered to see what he had seen.
“yeah...” Frypan muttered, “lights.”
Everyone breathed out a sigh of relief when suddenly a loud rumbling above them told them that they were in for a nasty storm.
“we need to run!” Newt yelled, “the storm will be upon us any minute!”
Without waiting for any further suggestion, the group broke into a sprint across the vast flat landscape. It was the maze all over again... just minus the walls and plus the lightning.
The stretch of open land seemed to go on forever and no matter how fast they ran it felt like it was doing no good. The storm was upon them now and the crackles of lightning were right overhead, snapping and exploding on their heels.
Fawn faintly recalled feeling someone grab her hand but she was so busy running and it was so dark save for the occasional clap of lightning that she could not tell who it was but she had a feeling that it was Newt.
She was glad that she was still early on in her pregnancy otherwise all of the running would have been near impossible for her.
“keep going!” Thomas’s voice was barely audible over the noise, “we’re almost there!”
It wasn't until 10 minutes later of constant running that Fawn began to believe Thomas’s encouraging shouts for the lights were much closer now, within a thousand yards and with each flash of lightning she could see that the lights were part of a building... at least three stories high but old and almost looked abandoned if it weren't for the bright lights.
Just when Fawn thought that they would reach the building in one piece the lightning began to strike right behind them, kicking up dirt and making the kids stumble. The person holding Fawn's hand began to pull her along at a faster pace when suddenly a cry ran out and everyone stopped.
“Minho!” Thomas yelled as he ran back to the boy who had obviously been hit by a lightning strike.
Fawn now knew that whoever had been holding her hand had been Newt for the boy let go and began to tell Frypan and Thomas to lift together on the count of three.
Fawn and Aris ran ahead to open the large old metal doors of the building as the three boys clumsily carried their fallen comrade inside.
They set him down gently on the cold floor and Aris switched on one of the flashlights and pointed it at the former runner. Fawn pushed past Thomas and knelt down beside the boy. She felt for a pulse and was relieved to find one.
she was just going to check out if he was breathing or not when he let out a gasp and sat up with a jolt, everyone smiling and laughing in relief.
“I definitely felt that!” Minho mumbled in a light tone when Aris let his flashlight drift around the room.
“guys,” he muttered.
Everyone looked away from Minho to see that the flashlight had landed on several crouched figures... that is until the figures were no longer crouching and were lounging towards them with screeches and hollers... cranks... yet again.
******
Instantly everyone went on the defensive, ready to run or to attempt to use their flashlights against the slew of cranks... until they realized that even though the cranks were shrieking, snarling and gnashing their teeth at them, the creatures weren't approaching. At first the gang suspected that they didn't like the lightning... Until they saw the chains...One for every crank that kept them from advancing any further.
Fawn was hesitant to look closer until she saw that the chains were so thick that there was no possible way that a crank could break loose. Just when she was about to speak, a flash of light to the side alerted the kids to a door opening on the other side of the crank army and out stepped a girl. She didn't look any older than the kids... maybe sixteen or seventeen. She had short brown hair and as she stepped closer, the kids saw that there was a path from them to the girl through the crank army.
“I see you have met our guard dogs.” the girl observed, “come on.”
The kids were not sure whether to listen or to turn tail and run until it dawned on them that if she was just a kid then she couldn't be for WICKED. Only an idiot would be a kid and be in favor of WICKED. Slowly they progressed through the cranks and followed the girl through the door. The place that they came upon was a massive, abandoned building where every inch had been transformed into a living environment. Old cars were half torn apart to make beds or little lean-to huts. The kids stared in wonder at how many people were there. Fawn couldn't remember the last time that she saw this many people... ever since she and the gang had been taken that is.
“Jorge.” the girl called, drawing the kids’ attention away from their surroundings to a black man who approached them, “found them at the back door.”
The man considered the kids for a moment with his piercing dark eyes, “what are you doing here?”
“we're looking for the Right Arm.” Thomas explained, “we need to avoid WICKED.”
Immediately Jorge's eyebrows shot up with interest, “WICKED? It's near impossible to avoid them. You must have done something to get on their bad side. Though you won't be able to find the Right Arm. They’re ghosts. They don't even exist.”
“you're not the Right Arm?” Teresa asked in confusion.
The strange girl scoffed, “obviously. We’re refugees hiding from WICKED.”
Minho opened his mouth to ask the next question but it never came out for a loud beeping noise sounded behind him and the kids spun around to see another man standing there with a small remote device in his hand.
“They have been tagged by WICKED.” he explained.
“Is that so?” Jorge asked, his voice suddenly sounding pleased, “that makes you very valuable.”
Fawn tensed. This did not sound too good...
“Why do you say that?” Newt asked.
Jorge chuckled as multiple men surrounded the kids and they realized that they were cornered. “Because if WICKED tagged you then you must be very valuable to them.”
Just as the men moved to grab the kids, the strange girl spoke up, “wait... she is not tagged.”
All eyes turned to Fawn who tried to put on a surprised look, but they could tell that this came as no surprise to the girl.
“Now that is peculiar.” Jorge muttered. “Chain them up... except her. Brenda, take her to the office.”
The kids, especially Newt, Minho and Thomas tried to fight the men as they grabbed each of them but they were no match. The boys and Teresa were dragged off one way and Fawn ushered the other way by Brenda. Fawn knew from experience the only way to stay alive was to compromise so she followed the girl into a small room that was void of anything but a table and two chairs. As she sat down in one, Brenda instructed Fawn to sit in the other chair. Fawn obeyed Brenda as the girl studied her.
“What is so special about you the WICKED would forgo tagging you if they deemed your friends valuable enough to tag?” Brenda asked thoughtfully.
Fawn shrugged, “they didn't. They didn't deem me special enough not to tag.”
“Then where is your tag?” Brenda questioned, confused by Fawn's response.
“I have had my fair share of encounters with WICKED so I know ways to bypass their security... not to mention their tagging.”
“You removed it!?” Brenda’s eyes widened in shock, “how?”
“You have to do it within 15 minutes of it being implanted otherwise it will have to be surgically removed,” the girl explained, “they tagged us when they pretended to check over our vitals so I used the toilet as an excuse to remove myself and I removed it. The tag is a small sliver of metal wire so it's magnetic. I used a magnet to remove it and kept it in my pocket so they didn’t suspect that I had removed it but once we left the facility, I ditched it in the sand. If I had tried to do that 15 minutes later then it would have damaged my spine.”
Brenda seemed thoroughly engrossed in Fawn's words, “you said that you have dealt with WICKED before... please elaborate.”
Fawn leant back in the chair, thoroughly enjoying sitting down after all of that running that they had done earlier, “I was a mercenary. Not as an assassin but more as a burglar, a spy... an informant, thief... hacker. I worked to gradually disable WICKED for years before they finally caught up with me and threw me into the maze.”
“but how could you have been put in the maze when you obviously have the skills to avoid their clutches?” Brenda asked.
“that's where it gets hazy. When WICKED took all of us in they wiped our brains but for me it only worked temporarily and recently I have been regaining some of my memory. I do not remember being captured by WICKED, but I recall right before I was brainwashed.”
Brenda hummed thoughtfully. “Correct me if I'm wrong but... your friends out there were in the maze with you and they seem very important to you... You do not suppose that when your memory goes blank... you had purposely given yourself over to WICKED to be put in the maze?”
And that was when Fawn realized that her forgotten picture of life just became a whole lot more complicated.
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You chapter 4
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Chapter 4
“Woah, watch your step,” a voice of one of the boys said as they trampled through the sand in the dark.
“hurry! The helicopters could be here any second.” the voice of Thomas cried.
The gang slid down the embankment into the mysterious abandoned building that they had come upon.
They needed a place to hide from the pursuing helicopters and also a place to take a breather since they had been running nonstop since Thomas came crawling out of the ventilation shaft.
The kids halted once they were all inside and one by one Thomas handed out flashlights he had swiped.
One he gave to Newt any other to Minho while he kept the third.
“what is this place?” Frypan whispered even though there was no enemy within hearing distance.
“it looks like an old shopping plaza,” Fawn muttered and when the group looked at her in puzzlement, she shrugged, “I had to visit one before I was taken by WICKED. It was a meeting place. Anyway this is either a large one or a mall.”
“well if it's a shopping building that maybe we will find some supplies.” Thomas reasoned and moved to explore when Teresa hissed.
“tell us what's going on Thomas!” she roared.
Everyone else rolled their eyes since it was kind of obvious that murderous psychos from WICKED were after them but perhaps that had not been made clear to Teresa after the five mile run through sand they had just completed.
Thomas sighed, “it's WICKED. The haven isn't safe at all. They take the kids and string them up and like Fawn saw in her vision, they were being drained.”
“dead?” Frypan shivered.
Thomas shook his head, “no but they were not alive either. They had cords attached their brains...There is something inside us, something WICKED needs.”
Fawn did not fail notice that Teresa shifted uncomfortably at those words.
“it’s a cure.” the girl explained. “WICKED took us in the 1st place because for some reason kids showed resistance to the flare. They think it is something in our... in our blood but it's not.”
Immediately all eyes were on her and Teresa looked a little too interested.
“what do you mean?” Newt whispered.
“I have been getting bits and pieces of my blocked memories and I think I had figured out a cure that did not involve anyone getting hurt. I also stole WICKED archives that contained all the information and hid it.”
“why didn't you just tell WICKED the cure so they would stop experimenting on us?” Teresa railed, trying to place blame on the girl.
Fawn shook her head, “because WICKED is disguising themselves as people who are solely looking for cure when they have been using it as a way to herd children in. WICKED is trying to take control of the world and what better way than to be the only hope of the cure.”
“and if you had revealed the cure they probably would have killed you and destroyed evidence of the cure,” Newt muttered, “that's why you and the White Rose had been fighting WICKED from the start and why they had been so determined to stop you!”
“I know a place where we can hide for now.” Aris spoke up, “I heard of people called the Right Arm who live in the mountains and have been fighting WICKED for years.”
Newt sighed, “people in the mountains? That is your plan? We don't even know if these people really exist or if they will help us.”
“we don't have much choice otherwise,” Fawn whispered gently in the hopes of lifting the tension, “if anything they will be better than WICKED.”
“hey guys,” Winston called from a distance to where he had wandered off, “you should see this. We were not the only ones down here.”
The group hurried over and saw that in the sand there were trails of footprints. Without hesitation the group followed the prints until they came upon what looked like a storage room.
The group fanned out searching for supplies while Minho and Thomas went in search of possible other rooms.
As Fawn searched through some boxes, she came upon one that contained clothes her size and she changed. She pulled on a black beanie, black pants, a purple checkered shirt and a fresh pair of socks.
She was thankful to be out of the clothes that had become tight on her, thanks to her slowly growing belly and expanding boobs.
“Fawn,” Newt called just as the girl put on a fresh pair of shoes, “here. Wear this. It's cold out here.”
The girl walked over and saw that Newt was holding out a black leather jacket so she slipped it on before smiling at him. She turned to leave when Newt grabbed her hand and dragged her to a corner away from the others before turning to look her earnestly in the eyes.
“what has been going on with you? You have been acting so weird lately and of all people you confide in Minho rather than in me.”
Fawn hung her head in guilt, “I'm sorry Newt but... a part of me is afraid of what you will say and the other is not sure how to actually tell you.”
Newt sighed, reaching out to pull the girl to his chest as he pressed a kiss to her hair, “you know that I could never be angry with you even if you told me in the most blunt way. I love you Fawn and I want to be there with you through whatever it is you are going through.”
Fawn smiled sadly up at Newt and rested her nose in his neck, breathing in the scent of him… woods, sweat and something akin to cinnamon.
She opened her mouth, prepared to say it in the most simplest of ways when the darkness vanished and the building was lit up into semi light.
The group of kids looked around in surprise. Thomas and Minho must have found a power source.
Fawn looked over at Drake who had been sniffing around suspiciously but now the dog froze, the hair on the back of his neck standing up on end and a deep growl vibrated from his throat.
Fawn’s hand instinctively went to her bow as she scanned their surroundings for the threat that Drake had detected.
Suddenly Thomas and Minho came sprinting around the corner, face white with fear as they screamed.
Behind them were what looked like people but were thin, gangly and looked horrifyingly like goblins from the old tales.
“Run!” Thomas yelled before Minho repeated the cue, “RUN!” The group jumped to their feet and grabbing the things they had gathered, they turned tail and ran.
“Not again,” Fawn sighed as she sprinted after Newt.
******
“run!” Thomas yelled for the fifth time in a row.
Fawn would have rolled her eyes if she was not busy trying to run for her life from cranks! If it did not look like to Thomas that they were running their legs off, she wondered what running looked like in his eyes.
She was glad that she was barely a month pregnant otherwise she would have been dead meat.
“through here!” Minho called from the front as he opened the door and the gang began to pile through.
Using the slow traffic to her advantage, Fawn pulled out her bow and struck one of the cranks who was closest.
Electricity shot through the creature’s body and when the beast touched other cranks nearby, they too got zapped.
“Yo Fawn!” Frypan yelled as he helped get everyone through the door, “keep doing... just that!”
Fawn chuckled as she reloaded her bow but got distracted when she heard Drake barking at her to get her attention.
The girl fired one more arrow before she bolted towards the door. She skidded to a stop when a cry cut through to her gut.
She would know that voice anywhere... Newt.
Spinning around Fawn saw Newt on the ground, a crank pinning him down... the boy only managed to keep an inch between himself and the creature as the crank snarled in his face.
Fawn related her bow and aimed. She let out a deep breath before she let the arrow fly and the crank flew off Newt, the arrow striking true.
“Newt come on!” Fawn yelled as she pushed through the door.
The boy was right behind her and just as Winston came barreling through the doors, a crank grabbed his leg.
“no!” several of the kids yelled.
While Thomas and Minho worked to close the door, Fawn and Newt grabbed Winston's hands and tried to pull him away as the crank continued to claw at him.
“Fawn!” Winston screamed.
Fawn kept one hand on his wrist while she grabbed an arrow and threw it. It missed the crank until the gang heard a slight ticking sound and the arrow buzzed, electrocuting the cranks and Minho slammed the door shut as Thomas pushed a bookcase in front of it while Newt pulled Winston away from the door.
The gang stumbled away until Winston began to cry out in pain from the scratches that the crank gave him so they slowed down and finding a hallway that was quiet, safe and seemingly free of cranks, they pulled to a halt to catch their breath.
Winston slumped against the wall and groaned. “in case we don't make it out of here alive in one piece... I just want you guys to know that I hate giant spiders and infected gargoyles.” he granted.
The kids chuckled softly, glad that the injured boy was trying to lift their spirits.
“while we are sharing secrets, I am afraid of heights and I love the smell of raw bacon.” Minho admitted.
“I don't get sunburn, I just tan.” Frypan added which earned him perplexed looks from the others.
“if I did not have a limp, I would have wanted to be a runner.” Newt added his own secret, the hallway soon becoming filled with the group sharing fun facts with each other... that is until one particular voice cut in, that made everyone freeze and forget what it meant to breathe.
“I'm pregnant.”
All eyes snapped to Fawn except Minho who was trying to look as surprised is the others but failing as he came to stand beside the girl as moral support.
Frypan and Thomas looked like they had just witnessed the sun dying before their eyes, their eyes wide and jaws touching their chests.
Winston looked confused, probably having never gotten “that talk” from his parents before WICKED took him and none of the Glade members saw the need to explain where babies came from.
Teresa looked smug and like she had just revealed someone's deep dark truth and was waiting for the wolves to tear their friend to shreds.
Newt was just standing there, eyes round and lips slightly parted as he stared at the redhead, frozen in time.
Fawn shifted nervously on her feet, looking at her shoes then at Minho who gave her a supportive encouraging smile and then back at Newt.
Finally, Newt spoke in a voice that was so soft it was a miracle that anyone heard him.
“So that is what Minho meant when he said that my knowing would only make me worry about you more than I already do.”
Fawn ducked her head, ashamed of keeping such a big secret from Newt. After all he was the expecting father!
The girl opened her mouth to apologize when she realized that Newt had approached her and now reached up to cup her face gently in his hands.
“but even if I did worry more, why would you keep this from me?” he whispered.
The rest of the gang looked at her quizzically, probably wondering the same thing while Teresa was grinning, waiting for somebody to start yelling at the girl.
“because if... if through all of this hardship, loss and pain... if I lost the baby I knew that it would break your heart and I didn't want to be the one responsible for bringing you more pain than you already bear daily.”
Newt smiled softly as tears pricked his eyes and he pressed his forehead to Fawn’s. “And I do not want you to bear the pain alone. If we lose this child, yes, I will be heartbroken but that does not mean that we cannot try again and I would rather bear all the pain the world has to offer, together with you than to let you suffer alone. Besides there is a high chance that this baby will survive. After all, they are half of you.”
Fawn sniffled, seeing Newt crying made her want to cry too but she tried to contain it but failed miserably when Newt pressed his lips to hers ever so gently in a kiss that tasted of salty tears.
“I love you Fawn... and I will love you no matter how many secrets you keep from me... but promise me that you will try and give me a chance to be a part of your secrets... especially if it involves our baby!” Newt whispered, not caring that the gang were watching the exchange.
Fawn smiled through her tears and nodded as Newt wiped away the tears with the pads of his fingers.
“OK... I will... and I love you to by the way.”
Frypan broke this special moment by cooing and he got glares from everyone, most of the group having been listening with bated breath to see what would happen next.
It was not every day that they learned one of their friends was pregnant and then got to witness some love exchange! Let's just say living in the glade did not give them a whole lot of experience with PDA.
The silence was broken by the screams of cranks in the distance, gradually getting louder, so once again, the group kicked back and began to run down the old, abandoned hallway.
When they reached the end, the cranks’ screaming was getting louder and almost breaking their ears and when they looked back, they saw that the creatures were on their tail.
Minho blew through the door at the end of the hallway and held a single door open as the group filed through.
Just as Newt and Fawn were about to run through, Fawn looked back and realized that they were one short...
“where is Drake?” she asked.
All eyes looked around... but there was no dog... no barking... and the cranks were almost upon them.
“DRAKE!” Fawn screamed.
the only answer she got was the screech of the cranks and Newt grabbing her hand to pull her through the door to safety.
The group found themselves in a dark trench of sand and they huddled together, shushing each other as the cranks roamed around above, searching for the group of kids that had intruded their abandoned mall.
Newt wrapped both of his arms around Fawn who was shaking... partly from the sobs and partly as she tried to pull away, a part of her yearning to dive into the cranks to find her dog... she could not lose anyone else... so why did it have to be Drake?
As she faded into a tearful sleep, she could have sworn she saw Drake's deep eyes looking back at her, tongue hanging out the side of his mouth... Black and white fur blowing in the wind.
What had she done? How could she have lost Drake?
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You Chapter 3
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Chapter 3
“what was that just now?” Newt demanded of Thomas when the group was sent back into the bunk room and locked in after Thomas had picked a fight with the guards. “are you trying to get us killed? It is one thing for Fawn to wake up from an epiphany and stated WICKED is here but you should not pick a fight over it!”
Thomas completely ignored the brunette as he crawled underneath his bunk bed and pulled out the grate of the ventilation shaft. The head of a young boy, Aris, poked out of the shaft and that was when Thomas turned to look at the others.
“it was a strategic plan,” he explained that he held up an access card, “to get this.”
The group stared in shock at the plastic key card while Minho and Fawn looked on, impressed with Thomas’s skills of deception and pick pocket expertise.
“there is something I need to do,” Thomas explained, “if my hunch is correct and what Fawn saw was real then I need to know before we all end up strung up on the walls and... how did you describe it Fawn?”
The girl shivered at the memory of her vision, “drained of life.”
Newt sighed and was prepared to give the runner a  lecture on being safe and less reckless when Fawn excused herself and bolted to the one-person bathroom.
The boys stared after her in bewilderment until they heard the sound of her puking up everything in her stomach. Minho hurried into the bathroom to help her, totally aware of what was happening while Newt tapped Thomas’s chest with his finger.
“be careful... we will be having this discussion later.” he said before rushing to the bathroom.
When the boy poked his head inside the small, crowded bathroom that was not more than five by four feet, he found Fawn kneeling on the floor with her face hovered over the toilet as she continued to vomit.
Minho crouched behind her, holding handfuls of red curls out of the girl’s face and rubbing her back in soothing circles.
If Newt did not know any better, he would have thought that Minho had done this before... The truth was that he had in the wee hours of the morning when his runner brain had woken him up early only to find everyone else asleep while Fawn suffered from morning sickness alone in the bathroom.
Newt fished around for a towel and soaked it in warm water before handing it to Fawn who had gone limp as she panted, trying to rest her sore stomach muscles.
“are you alright? What was that about? Did the food not agree with you?”
He asked in such a genuinely concerned stone that Fawn was tempted to tell him the truth right there and then as she sat on the bathroom tile floor but then she recalled her dream and what she knew that Thomas would find.
After learning the danger that they were in, Newt would have a world of worry weighing him down and he already worried himself sick over Fawn.
If he knew that she was carrying his child, that worry would triple until it drove him practically insane! The girl wiped her mouth with a towel and smiled warmly up at him.
“yeah, I'm fine. I'm just tired... must be a bug or cold or something.”
Newt nodded but frowned as Minho supported the girl as she rose to her feet and he escorted her to the bunk beds where Fawn lay down on the lowest bunk which happened to be Thomas’s and closed her eyes in content exhaustion.
Minho sat down on the edge of the bed and stroked the girl's arm, knowing that it always soothed the girl to sleep after she had hurled her stomach to death.
“Minho,” Newt whispered as he sat down on the bed nearest to the one where Fawn lay.
He made sure that the girl was asleep before he leant forward while folding his hands together and laying his elbows on his knees.
Frypan and Winston made themselves scarce, knowing that Newt only sat in that particular position when he was preparing to lecture or scold the unlucky shank who found himself sitting across from him. Minho also recognized the position he found his best friend in and turned to look at Newt but kept stroking Fawn’s arm.
“is there something going on with Fawn that I do not know about? Something you should, as my friend, share with me?” Newt asked.
Minho met Newt’s gaze without hesitation and that proved to Newt that Minho was not going to lie. This pleased Newt but also worried him since he did not know if he would like the truth.
“if you are asking if I have feelings for Fawn or if I'm going behind your back to be near her, then no. Fawn is like a little sister to me and i know the two of you well enough to know that if the two of you or ever reincarnated as a cat and a mouse, you would still be head over heels in love.”
Newt found himself smiling shyly at his friends’ words. The guys never really talked about his and Fawn’s relationship since they left the maze but hearing that onlookers believe them to be in love told the boy that Fawn did love him.
Even though Fawn told him frequently, his self-anxiety sometimes got the better of him.
“then why all the mystery?” he asked softly, “you 2 have been as thick as thieves since we arrived here. Fawn has been using the bathroom three times an hour, she has strange eating habits and she sleeps like a bear in the midst of hibernation. But I get the feeling that you know the reason behind these strange alterations in her behavior.”
“Well on that note, I can't lie to you. It is true that Fawn has been acting different and I know why but trust me when I say that you do not need to worry about it. Fawn has a completely under control... but I am not in the position to tell you what that reason is... only that it is Fawn’s call to tell you or not.”
“but why did she tell you not me?” Newt asked, feeling slightly hurt.
Minho smiled, “because she loves you man. She loves you so much that she knows how worried you are right now with everything that is going on and she does not want you to have more than you already have to worry about. She told me because it is not related to me and she needed someone to know. Just promise me that you won't push her to tell you until she is ready because otherwise she may shy away into a shell like a crab.”
Newt sighed softly before he nodded in defeat, “alright. But the moment it gets dangerous or puts Fawn in danger, I will be asking you to spill. Hear me?”
Minho nodded, “absolutely. I would not even need you to ask me to tell you if this got dangerous.”
Just then, the grate of a ventilation shaft flew open and Thomas came scurrying out like a rabbit. Fawn shot awake just in time to see Thomas push a desk and mattress against the door of the room.
“Thomas, what is going on?” Winston demanded from the worried boy.
“we need to leave now.” the boy panted, “They’re coming. They're coming to kill us and we need to leave now. Fawn was right. They string the kids up and drain them and there was Ava Paige... she is still alive. She was talking to Janson and they are coming for us and they're going to torture Fawn to get her to tell them where the White Rose is and they said something about Project Retrieval.”
“Woah there,” Minho called, grabbing the boy’s arms, “Thomas calm down and speak clearly.”
Thomas looked around the room in pure fear, “it's WICKED. They are here and they found out who Fawn is. They're coming for us.”
*******
When Thomas had said that squeezing out through the ventilation shafts would be easy Fawn had believed him even though it turns out, Thomas forgot about the little factor called numbers. Because traveling with almost eight people was a danger of being too loud and becoming detected, they had to crawl slowly in order to not make any noise.
Some of the kids crawled slower than others and soon there was a little bit of a traffic jam while everyone waited for Frypan to get his shirt unstuck from a loose screw.
Fawn found herself standing still on her hands and knees, trying to not let the metallic smell of the shaft get to her overly sensitive stomach while at the same time trying to not look at the only thing she could look at, Minho’s rump which was inches from her face as they both waited for the traffic to keep going.
Her palms and knees were beginning to hurt from crawling... and not crawling so she slumped to her forearms to give her wrists a break but no sooner had she done that when Newt tapped her on the ankle to get her attention.
“Fawn, it is bad enough with your bum in front of me but could you not... position... yourself... in that position?”
Fawn flushed and pushed herself back onto her hands and she could have sworn that Minho snickered so she swatted the nearest thing of him: his ramp and got a louder laugh in response.
“shut up you.” she growled at him.
Soon Frypan got unstuck and traffic once again began moving at a steady pace until Thomas and Aris reached the exit vent and pushed it open.
Thomas crawled out first to check their surroundings for any sign of danger before he summoned the others out.
Fawn immediately stretched when she was able to stand again while Aris and Winston disappeared back into the vent to “do something” according to Aris.
With Thomas at the lead, the kids hurried down the hallways in search of a way out and to everyone's chagrin, except Thomas of course, to find out where Teresa was being kept.
“quick question Fawn,” Frypan whispered, “how come WICKED did not take your bow and arrows when they knew how good you are with it?”
“they do not know that she has it,” Thomas answered for her in a whisper, “and they do not know that she has her memories back. Ava and Janson were talking about it. They think that she is harmless. They did not even know that she had a bow when she entered the maze.”
Newt snorted, “Harmless? Fawn? Boy are they a little behind.”
Just when the others were about to agree, they went around the corner and almost collided with a female doctor who looked at the group suspiciously. “what are you kids doing out?” she asked them.
Minho and Frypan both grabbed one of the woman’s arms and Thomas spoke to her.
“where is Teresa?” he demanded.
The woman shook her head, “in the experiment lab.”
With that, the boy strode on taking the doctor with them as a means of entry. They had almost reached the lab door when gunshots began firing at them and the kids ducked to avoid the gunman.
They ducked behind a corner but the gunman would get to them soon and they had no escape route. Newt sensed movement to his left and he turned to see Fawn loading her bow with a white colored arrow.
“Fawn be careful.” he warned as the girl leapt out and fired the arrow.
The boys all watched as the arrow flew right past the man. she had aimed too far to left! The gun man sneered as he lifted his gun again.
“you missed.”
Fawn smirked as she held her bow far to the right and suddenly the man was tripped from behind. It happened so fast that the boys had not seen the wire attached to end of the arrow nor the fact that the arrow and the bow were magnetic, tripping the man with the returning wire.
Minho rushed over to the down gunman and socked him in the face, knocking him out while Thomas got the doctor to unlock the lab door.
“are all your arrows like that?” Newt asked the girl in a whisper.
Fawn shrugged, “one for every situation… for the most part.”
When the doctor finally opened the lab door, the group rushed inside and bolted the door behind them. Minho and Newt aimed the guns that they had taken off the gunman at the people present while Thomas went searching for his girl.
When he found her, she was laying on a cot, drowsy as Thomas woke her up but only Fawn noticed how her chest was heaving as if she had just run a mile and her pupils were minuscule, indicating that she had been opening her eyes in a bright environment not more than half a minute ago.
Strange... something was up with the raven haired girl and Fawn was not sure she liked it.
Suddenly the silence was broken by Minho who yelled out.
“guys! Janson and his goons are coming!”
While Minho and Newt set about barricading the door, Thomas grabbed a chair and tried to break glass window that separated them from the nearest exit. When his attempts did not work, Newt also grabbed a chair and together they shattered the glass.
The boys began vaulting over the ledge while Teresa stopped and pulling off her sweater, she laid it down on the ledge to protect her from the glass and Fawn rolled her eyes. It was a miracle that the girl had survived the maze at all!
This girl was for too comfortable and calm when being pursued by mad murderous psychos.
The kids bolted through the door on the other side of the glass and down another corridor towards the huge door that led out back to the large garage where they had been brought in when they had been landed in the helicopter.
Thomas used the key card to try and open the door but in response he got a red deep. Oh great! Just what they needed when freedom was on the other side of the door!
“Thomas!” the infuriatingly obnoxious voice of Janson called.
Thomas spun around and handed the key part to Minho who tried his best at opening the door while Thomas took his gun and began firing at Janson.
It was to no avail for Janson had brought his troop of guards with plastic shields. Thomas was running out of ammunition once Minho spoke up.
“do any of you smell gunpowder or is that just me?” he asked.
The gang looked around, looking for a secret bomb or something until all their eyes landed on Fawn who had another arrow notched to her bow. This arrow was as black as.
“Fawn…” Minho whispered, “what does that one do?”
Fawn only smirked as she let the arrow fly. In a blink of an eye the arrow that was coated in gunpowder on the arrow tip and the rest of the arrow made from wick, slid against the bow as it flew away and unbeknownst to everyone but Fawn, the bow had a built in flint.
The arrow buried itself in the floor right in front of the plastic shielded guards and within two seconds, the explosion went off.
Thomas sprinted back out of the way just as the garage door flew open and there stood Aris and Winston who had opened the door from the other side!
The kids charged out, breathing in the fresh scent of the outdoors and they could hear alarms blaring as they ran out into the darkness.
The sand was cool beneath their feet as they ran away from the bright lights of the WICKED facility.
Helicopters buzzed overhead but none of the lights caught the small group of friends who tried to not stumble in the loose sand dunes. They are free.
Free from WICKED for the first time in years... now all they had to do was keep it that way and find a safe place.
Fawn knew it would take time to get her most important memories back but she knew that she was a wanted fugitive and she wondered where on earth that she hid those archives?
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You chapter 2
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Chapter 2
“Oh my gosh!” Minho whisper yelled as the group was led into a large lunch room .
Almost every table was full of kids! They ranged from about 12 years old to probably 18 or even 19 years old. not only that but there was an equal amount of girls as there were boys.
“what is all this?” Newt whispered.
Fawn shook her head, just as puzzled. She wished she could ask Thomas if he knew anything but the boy had been led off by Janson to have a talk. That made Fawn’s gut turn in worry. The group cautiously made their way towards the nearest table that was empty and sat down.
A couple of ladies wearing aprons and nets in their hair came out with Styrofoam plates and placed one in front of each of the kids. The plates were loaded with meat, vegetables, fruit, bread and with each plate came a plastic water bottle and a juice box with straws.
The boys immediately tucked into the food having not eaten since they left the Glade and they were starving. Fawn considered her plate and tried to find out what she could eat without feeling sick.
Finally she began to shovel in the fruit and liquids down, shoving her meat and bread onto Newt’s plate. When the boy went to protest she grabbed the fruit from his plate and when the boy saw how readily she was eating the fruit, he did not complain about her rejecting the other articles of food.
Minho was struggling with opening his water bottle until Fawn reached over and taking the bottle from him, popped the top off and returned it to him.
The boys all looked at her like she had grown 3 heads.
“what? We used to drink water from those things before WICKED. It's just been a while.” She pointed out, chugging her water down before she grabbed her juice and stabbed it with a straw and began to sip.
“Fawn,” Winston spoke up, “how much do you remember before WICKED?”
Fawn froze, “that is a strange thing. when I got my memories back I remembered when we were kids but after Thomas was taken... there was a gap... like I blacked out for years and then the other memories I have are when we were prisoners of WICKED... under their tests and right up to the moment when we were brainwashed”
Newt leant across the table towards her, “do you think that WICKED blocked some of your memories? Because they were so important? I mean, you can shoot a bow like it's another arm, you have a tattoo... none of us have anything like that.”
Fawn nodded, “I was thinking the same thing because the things that I cannot recall are how I got my bow, how I learned to even use it, the tattoo... and strangely enough... I do not remember the day we were taken. It was like Thomas left for WICKED and I fell asleep and then I woke up in a cage... years later .”
Minho grunted, eyebrows knitted in deep thought, “that is totally strange because Thomas never mentioned seeing you when he worked for WICKED. He remembers working on us but never you. What if you were in a different facility and they were the ones who gave you the tattoo?”
Winston wagged his finger in the air, “that is a thought, but what I do not get is how the sting did not bring all of the memories back.”
“well,” Fawn observed, “I was one of the later ones who came up to the Glade and even Thomas had more memories than the rest of you. Perhaps WICKED had been trying a new form of brainwash that kept certain memories back permanently but was not as good at keeping other memories back.”
“there is Thomas now,” Minho sighed, jumping up to go greet their friend who seemed just as stunned as they had been a moment ago.
Just then, three boys hopped down on the other side of the table and grinned at them.
“hey!” their first guy, a blonde greeted, “you guys are new. I'm Charlie.”
Newt smiled and shook the boy's hand, the others following suit. When Fawn shook his hand however the boy's eyes widened.
“so you are the cool new girl everyone is talking about,” Charlie observed, “some of the other kids got stung on their way out of their maze and got their memories back. They said that before they were taken they were told stories of the Avenging Angel. They said that she was a girl with hair like fire and a bow made from the moon. No one ever saw her but some of the kids think she is you.”
Fawn scoffed, “because of my red hair and the fact that I carry a bow? That is just a coincidence. It is just a myth.”
The other boy, Steven, shrugged, “that may be so but according to the myth, the Angel was known by only two names and they were the names of the ones that she was avenging: Sangster and O'Brien.”
Fawn had been slurping the last jobs of her juice from the box when the table went utterly quiet. when the boys saw Fawn's reaction, they knew that those names had struck something deep, hidden and familiar.
The girl slowly stood up from the table and grabbed her empty plate. Newt hopped up and followed the girl to the trash bin where she discarded her trash, face frozen and body tense like she had died and come back to life but only partly.
“Fawn?” Newt asked, “are you OK? You look like you have just seen a ghost! What did those guys say that caused this? Were they being too insensitive? I can beat them up if you want me to.”
Fawn weakly shook her head, “no... what they said proved that the myth... is real and the chances of my being the Avenging Angel are incredibly high.”
Newt frowned, “why do you say that?”
Fawn turned the boy with a faraway glossy look in her eyes, “Newt, when you were brainwashed, you guys all forgot your last names... but I remember them... I remember every last one of them.”
Newt swallowed thickly, “the names... O’Brian and Sangster... they are familiar aren't they? That is why you are like this.”
“yeah.” the girl choked, “O'Brien... is Thomas is last name and Sangster... Newt, that is your last name. Your name is Newt Sangster.”
“bloody hell,” the boy mumbled in shock, his own eyes widening to the size of saucers, “then that means...”
Fawn nodded, “you and Thomas were taken before I was in whatever happened during that blank.... I had been avenging your absence by fighting WICKED.”
“what if you weren't fighting them? Maybe you were trying to run from them?” the boy suggested, knowing that all of this was scaring the girl just like it scared him.
Fawn shook her head, “I doubt it... you see, you know my tattoo is a White Rose right? Well … the day that Thomas left, your mom spoke about a group of Warriors called the White Rose. Our fathers and grandfathers were all members. They were on elite team of highly trained Warriors who fought injustice and to protect other people. they are centuries old and … Newt if WICKED had begun taking kids from our village, they would have revolted. What if I had joined them after all the people I love were taken? I became a member of an elite fighting group... who either disappeared or were completely wiped out.”
Newt ran his fingers through his hair. He would have commented if Janson had not appeared and called everyone to attention. The two kids returned to their table as the man began calling out names of kids who began to line up behind him.
“what's going on?” Thomas asked.
“every day new kids are chosen to go to the safe place,” Charlie explained, “it is like a safe haven where they can start a new life away from WICKED. Lucky guys.”
Fawn frowned as she watched the kids cheer whenever they were chosen to go up before Janson and the kids departed through double doors... followed by a handful of armed guards.
“they're like sheep.” she mumbled.
“what did you say?” Minho asked.
Fawn nodded towards the departing kids. “those guys... they are led to believe that there is a good and safe place beyond that door… but no one told them what will happen beyond those doors. It is just like how when we lead the animals into the slaughterhouse. They think that it is safe inside, that they will be fed and put to bed but the moment that they put their guard down, we silence them... slaughter them to be used as food.” the girl whispered as the boys listened in horror, “those kids, are sheep being led off to God knows where. They are being led off to the slaughter house and how much do you want to bet it is not a safe haven?”
******
It was night, a quarter till midnight to be exact and Fawn could not sleep for the life of her. she could only sleep on her left side and could not have any limbs tucked underneath her so she had taken to hugging her pillow.
All this newness, the new place and new people not to mention the memories were messing her up and making her life miserable. At least she had one consolation.
She heard a voice hiss at her and she cracked her eyes open to see Minho waving at her from the bank across from her. she saw something white come flying in her direction until it landed on her bunk and then she saw that it was a Styrofoam Cup and attached to the bottom of it was a string...A mini telephone.
The girl found herself grinning from ear to ear. This was something that Minho used to do before WICKED and before the maze. Little bits of the old him were shining through.
She held the cup flush against her ear and she heard Minho whisper through it so as to not wake the others.
“are you alright? You have been acting a little weird since we left the maze and you would not let that nurse take any tests. Is there something you are worried about? Something from your memories?”
Fawn pressed her mouth to the Cup and whispered back, “no it's not that. I don't trust these people and I do not think that their intentions are genuine or should be trusted.”
Minho whispered back, “Are you sure that is all? I get this feeling like it is more than that and I can tell that you are keeping something bottled up inside. You can talk to me Fawn; you know that right?”
Fawn smiled, “yeah I know Minho. You are one of the few I trust right now. You and Newt. I just... I'm afraid that if I tell anyone, somehow it will get out and I will not be able to protect the secret once it is out and I shudder to think what will happen if Janson and his goons find out.”
“find out what Fawn? I promise you that I will never disclose any secret you tell me unless you give me leave too.” Minho replied.
“I know that Minho but what if you are taken prisoner and tortured or if it just comes out by accident without you realizing it?”
“it won't,” Minho promised her, “I assure you, if you have managed to keep this a secret until now and have not slept off once then I may be able to. I am not exactly as chatty as Thomas and Frypan are.”
Fawn chuckled before she sighed heavily, “OK, just promise me that you will not tell a soul... not even Newt?”
Minho nodded and pressing the cup back to her lips, the girl whispered back to him.
*********
It was morning, exactly a quarter till lunch and the kids were lounging in their bunk room. they did not know why but except for meals and selection, no one was allowed out of their bunk rooms and the door was always locked.
Fawn had snuck some extra food into her pockets at breakfast to last her till lunch since they were only allowed three meals a day, no in between snacks and only water to drink in between.
“I wonder if we will get called today.” Winston mused aloud, “I don't want to be chosen unless the rest of you guys are chosen to. I will be scared to go along with strangers and no friends with me.”
“I personally hope none of us get picked,” Frypan observed, “after what Thomas said he saw last night on his expedition into the ventilation shaft, I dread that door opening even if it's for lunch.”
“it will be fine guys,” Newt assured everyone, “all of us will be fine and if what Thomas says is true and these people are up to something, we will figure it out and we will have each other's backs through it all. Alright? We've got this.”
The boys seemed content with that encouragement and Frypan went back to aggravating Winston by throwing his pillow at his head.
Fawn set up from where she had been making her bed for the fifth time, bored out of her life. When she scanned the room she saw Minho watching her like a Hawk and it unnerved her.
He had taken her secret surprisingly well, only blowing out one of her eardrums when he had shrieked into the cup. Luckily the Styrofoam muted the noise so no one else heard it.
Newt climbed up the ladder to his bank which was adjacent to Fawn’s. He leant over across the wedge of bunk that separated the two beds from each other.
“how are you doing?” he asked gently.
Married smirked, “I am ready for lunch!”
The boy chuckled before leaning over and pressing a sweet kiss to the girl's lips. Their skin barely touched when Fawn drew back like she had been bitten and her eyes rolled into the back of her head.
“holy crap, Fawn!” Newt cried and began to try and shake her awake until Minho hastily climbed up the rungs until he sat next to Newt.
“hold up... she did this when she got stung. Maybe her memories are coming back again.” he suggested.
Newt nodded but held the girl's hand gently as he watched her chest rise and fall in gentle breaths. He could not lose her. not after he lost Alby, Chuck and Gally.
Not Fawn, just when he got her back... not when he wanted to know more about their pasts together and find out what the future holds for both of them.
Meanwhile, Fawn was getting a rush of memories all so fast and condensed together like someone had hit rewind on her life. She saw men in white carrying and dragging away her family... dragging away Gally, Alby, Minho... Newt... she could feel the tears on her face as she pressed her lips to Newt’s for the very first time as a man grabbed Newt by the arm and shoved him into a truck.
She remembered men with guns firing on the adults who tried to revolt. Fawn could feel her father pick her up and carry her away before she was taken to. She could feel a bow being placed in her hand and a target before her eyes. She could hear the screams and cries of people dying in raining fire from helicopters.
She felt the sharp needle as she was given her rose tattoo. She could hear the voices of her parents crying her name out before they were cut off by the snap of a gunshot. She could hear herself say it over and over again.
“this is for Sangster and O'Brien and for everything you have done to them. I will get them back if I kill myself doing it.”
She could remember the foul feeling of arms pinning her down and she felt the familiar sensation of being locked up in a tube of water. WICKED. She could hear the voice of Ava Paige and Teresa as they spoke about her.
“we need to kill her now. The brainwash is being rejected by her body. Her willpower is too strong.” Teresa’s voice said, “she cannot go on living. She knows all of our secrets. She was the one who raided the archives and stole all that data. We cannot find out where she hid it but she knows where it is.”
“we cannot kill her,” Ava Paige said, “she can lead us to the remaining White Rose. She got us off their scent in the first place, she can get us back on. She is strong and has survived all of the tests. She may be the key to the cure. We can block out the memory she has when she was a spy. She will be harmless but we must keep her a safe distance from those friends we always heard about… Sangster and O'Brien. Sadly, we don't know any of the children's last names. No matter, her friends are probably girls since she is a girl. She won't get her memories back if we put her in that one maze with all the boys. Place her there. And find out where those archives are.”
As Fawn was dragged back into consciousness, she got a glimpse of something that made her blood run cold.
She snapped awake and almost headbutted Newt but he backed up in time,
“Woah, are you OK?” Newt asked.
The girl looked around until she saw Thomas, “you need to get into that room,” she panted, “now!”
Just then the door of the room opened and the kids were all escorted out to lunch. as they went, Minho grabbed Fawn by the arm and hissed in her ear.
“will you tell Newt about you-know-what?”
Fawn shook her head, “he has enough to worry about right now and in my memories, I took info from WICKED and they and Teresa want me dead... like big time. And not to mention, I think WICKED might be here... in this facility.”
Minho nodded, “OK, but as soon as we are safe, you need to tell him. Newt has a right to know that you are pregnant and carrying his child.”
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the-jade-cross · 1 year
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Only You Chapter 1
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* For any of you confused by the author FairyofHogwarts, that is my profile name on Quotev and that is where I transfer all my stories from. It is easier to write on a daily basis on Quotev so I write there and once the stories are done, I transfer them here to Tumblr;)
Chapter 1
“Thomas! Don’t run so fast!” nine-year-old Fawn Fields yelled. “You will spill the berries if you don’t slow down and Gally will kill you if we don’t bring him some!”
Ten-year-old Thomas grinned cheekily back at Fawn, amused at how her short red curls bounced in her eyes as she ran, “You’re just slow!”
Fawn rolled her eyes at the skinny boy who had limbs much too long for his body and a head full of black hair that always seemed greasy. As the two kids came close to the village, Fawn saw the many of the kids were running home for lunch.
“Your running will kill you one day!” she hollered as she saw Minho Lee came barreling out of his house when he heard their return.
“Or it will save him,” the dark haired boy teased. “Don’t mama him Fawny. He’s already got a mama and she says to come home before lunch or she will tan your hide Thomas!”
Thomas cringed, “I have to get these berries to newt! He hasn’t tried them yet and Fawn and I picked them especially for his birthday!”
When the three friends trooped into the last house on the hill, they found Newt trying to teach his little sister Sonya how to braid her own hair. Mrs. Sangster was attempting to groom the boy’s thick curls but to no avail and she gave up when Thomas sat down the bowl of berries in front of the ten year old boy.
“Happy Birthday!” Fawn squealed as she ran over to hug Newt from behind, “You’re older than me now!”
“Just for five months,” Tall, twelve year old Gally Poulter stated as he entered the house. “Then you will turn ten and you two will be twins till next July.”
Minho playfully punched Gally in the arm, “Where is Frypan?”
“Said he wanted to make cookies before he filled up on berries. Gimme,” the boy replied.
Fawn planted herself between Gally and the bowl, “not until Newt tries them! This is his first time tasting them!”
Newt grabbed a handful of the orange, yellow tipped berries and shoved them into his mouth. He chewed before his face scrunched up in disgust and he rushed out of the house. Him spitting them out into the grass could be heard before he returned, wiping his mouth with his sleeve.
“Those are gross! How do you eat those things?” he asked.
Thomas sighed, “it is peculiar. Some of the kids love them but others hate them. Winston hates them and had the same reaction you did and then there are people like Gally���”
As the group looked at the boy in question, Gally had shoved a handful of berries into his mouth and looked like a chipmunk as he tried to speak.
“Weird thing is none of the adults like them. Maybe you’re too grown up to like them Newt.” He stated, spewing berry juice.
Fawn and Thomas dove to grab a few when Mrs. Sangster spoke up. “Those are the Uthana berries aren’t they? From beyond the hills?”
Fawn nodded, “Yeah… don’t the White Rose and Uncle Lenny use them?”
The woman smiled and nodded, “You are right dear. The members of the White Rose infuse the berries into their weapons. It is an old tradition of our people that has been passed down through generations. No one knows how it started or why but we keep doing it.”
“I have to go now,” Thomas spoke up as he wiped his berry stained lips, “My ma said to be home for lunch. Happy birthday Newt!”
The birthday boy grinned as Thomas bolted out the door, Fawn yelling after him to slow down. Gally and Minho departed next, taking the bowl with them and Fawn turned to Newt nervously.
“Do you want to watch the sunset with me?” she whispered.
Newt beamed while his ears pinked, “S…sure!”
Mrs. Sangster poked his cheek playfully, “You need to get your chores done first.”
“Aw ma!” the boy whined as Fawn headed out.
Later that night as the sun began to lower down, Fawn sat waiting for newt on their spot on the highest hill where they could see the village below and the setting sun ahead.
“Hey,” the boy greeted as he sat down beside her, “Sorry I took so long. Alby was trying to keep Gally and Thomas from fighting again.”
Fawn chuckled, “Those two will always be at odds.”
Newt glanced down at their village and sighed, “You know, ma says that in four years they will tear down our village and build something here…. She says that the sun is destroying the plants and soon this place will be like a dessert.”
Fawn sighed and took the boy’s hand in hers, “But we will live on. we will keep living because we have each other.”
Newt smiled at the girl, “Do you ever worry about WICKED coming and taking us away like we have heard them do before?”
Fawn grabbed Newt’s face and turned him to look at her, “Even if they do, I promise I will find you. Do you promise to never forget me? ever? Even if it is years and years?”
Newt grinned his cute smile, “Even if I lose my memory, I will never forget you Fawn. not now, not ever.”
Just then, the two heard someone yell their names and they spun around to see Gally running towards them, “Guys! It’s Thomas! He fell! He was running and he fell and hit his head and now he doesn’t remember anything!”
Fawn and Newt leapt to their feet and Fawn faintly felt her hand prick on a thorn but she barely felt it as she and Newt sprinted down the hill back to the village. When they arrived back in the village, Mrs. O’Brien was climbing into one of the trucks with Thomas in her arms, tears running down her face. Fawn saw the boy staring blankly at all the faces around him, not recognizing any of them!
“Where are they going?” Fawn asked Minho.
“She is taking him to WICKED. If anyone can fix him, it is them,” the boy told her.
Fawn felt tears prick her eyes and rubbed them away with her hands. All of a sudden Minho stared at her in horror.
“Fawn, you’ve got blood smeared on your face!” he stated.
Fawn looked down and saw that her hands were bleeding form a single thorn in her palm. Newt and Minho gasped at the sight of the purple thorn. The children of the village had been taught from infancy that the Grief plant’s thorns were deadly if you got pricked more than three times in your life.
“it’s just one thorn,” Newt told her, “You’ll be fine…. Fawn…. did you get any in your eyes? Your eyes are looking funny.”
Fawn frowned, barely listening for her vision had gone blurry when suddenly a red searing pain struck her eyes and she screamed in pain.
“FAWN!” Newt’s voice woke the girl from her sleep. “Wake up! You have to get up! We’re here and there are people shooting at us! Hurry and get up Fawn!”
The girl stumbled to her feet and gasped as she followed Newt out into the darkness. Grief plant poison… Griever’s sting…. It all made sense… and Thomas not saying anything about it before because he had hit his head and lost all those memories…. But Newt…. How did Newt know her name even after WICKED?
*******
Fawn blinked in the darkness from outside as it gave way to the bright electric light of the indoors. The place that they found themselves in looked like a huge storage room or moving garage with hot wires hanging around. Definitely a step down from the glade. Fawn felt Newt grabbed her hand and she looked at him with wide eyes, full of fear.
Just then, an adult man approached them wearing a turtleneck and leather jacket. He gave them a smile but something about the man did not sit well with Fawn. He felt sketchy.
“hello kids. Glad to see that you are all safe. I'm Mr. Janson,” he greeted, “follow me please.”
As the group cautiously followed the man deeper into the building, Fawn tried to squeeze her way towards Thomas but the boy was set on listening to every word that the man was saying. Fawn groaned in defeat. She wanted to talk to Thomas and find out if he remembered anything before WICKED.
“this place is where you kids will get to rebuild your lives and have a second chance at life,” Janson stated as he used his key card to open a sliding door that revealed a long hallway of doors, “but first let's do something about that smell.”
The kids were shuffled off into a huge bathroom that had multiple stalls and multiple showers separated by a wall each. The boys raced into the showers, glad for the relief and freshness the hot water and soap provided.
As Fawn got into one of the further stalls and washed the dirt and blood from her body, Drake stood proud at the entrance, prepared to shoo away any of the boys who threatened her privacy.
When Fawn was done, she tied her wet hair back in a braid and pulled on a clean shirt and shorts that Mr. Janson had provided. The girl then coaxed Drake into the water and use the body soap to wash his thick fur.
The dog rather enjoyed himself once his owner rinsed the soap from his fur, leaving his coat a shiny black and white.
Fawn sat on the floor and used one of the towels to rub the dog down as he sat between her legs, knowing that the Husky would leave a wet spot wherever he went if she did not. The boys were just finishing and changing into fresh clothes when Teresa approached Fawn from behind and pulled up the back of the girl’s shirt, almost revealing Fawn's tattoo but Fawn shot around before she could and Newt intervened.
“Woah there,” he observed, “personal space Teresa. You may be a girl too but Fawn did not give you for permission to touch her like that.”
Teresa tossed her hair over her shoulder defiantly. Fawn noticed that even after a shower, the girl’s dirty smirk and suspicious eyes did not rinse off. “being suspicious much? Why hasn't she told anyone that she has a tattoo on her back?”
Newt want to speak up for her but Fawn rose to her feet and interrupted the debate, “partially because I did not know I had one until a few weeks ago. Secondly because it is none of your business if I tell you are not and thirdly, speaking of suspicious, why didn’t you tell Thomas that when WICKED took him in, he had lost his memory to an injury and his mother had brought him to WICKED to be cured but instead of fixing him they used him as a pawn for their games?”
The whole group went utterly silent, wide eyes traveling from girl to girl until they all looked at Thomas who looked just as shocked as the rest of them.
“how do you know that?” he asked shakily, “even I don't remember that.”
“I got some of my memories back when I got stung. Turns out when you got injured and lost your memory, you only forgot events and people. WICKED was able to get some information out of you concerning a plant that is venomous.”
“grief thorns,” Thomas mumbled, “the poison in the grievers. How did you know about those? I don't remember even meeting you before the maze.”
Fawn nodded, “the day your mother took you to WICKED, you had hit your head while running and forgot even the names of your best friends. I had told you not to run. And then after Alby and Newt had to keep you and Gally from fighting, you went and tripped while running and that was the last time I ever saw you.”
Newt stepped forward, “we... we were all there?” he asked.
Fawn nodded, “Frypan, Winston, Zart... Ben... everyone... except Teresa.”
Thomas began to shake, “you... you said that my running would be the end of me one day... but Minho told you that I did not need you to mama me.”
Frypan chuckled, “that sounds like Minho.”
The boys were out about to ask more when the door opened and Janson reappeared, “good. You're all cleaned up. now for your quarters. I hope you don't mind but Fawn, you will be sharing with the boys.”
Fawn shrugged, “I've done it up till now. It's not like their snoring is totally annoying.”
Janson led the small group off to what appeared to be a high tech hospital room with several beds and nurses waiting for them.
Each of the kids were assigned to a nurse who reviewed them, tested vitals, gave them shots and in Minho's case, tested their endurance.
Fawn sat on her assigned bed, watching Minho run when a female nurse approached the girl with a plastic cup.
“I need you to go into the bathroom over there and pee in this,” the woman explained.
Fawn took the cup but felt her stomach drop. They were not having the boys do this... they were up to something. She went into the bathroom and purposely did not get any urine in the cup.
Minho watched on the treadmill as the lady kept sending Fawn back into the bathroom to try again but by the 8th try, the woman was losing her patience and Minho was chuckling in amusement.
Fawn had been difficult earlier when the nurse had tried to take her vitals as well. Fawn did not easily trust that was for sure but when the nurse finally gave up and left, the boy noticed Fawn sighing in relief.
Interesting. he would have to speak with her about that later. it was not like Fawn to be difficult or defensive. Had her getting her memories back caused this? When they were done, Janson escorted the group, minus Teresa to a bunker room where multiple bunks lined the walls.
After Janson left them to get situated, the boys began to race to see who would get the top bunks. Fawn settled down on one of the lower bunks while Thomas paced and worried over Teresa.
“say Fawn,” Frypan called from the opposite bunk, “what were we like when we were younger? Where we much different from how we are now?”
Fawn smiled as she leant back against her pillow, “no actually... you still cooked all the time and you were Gally’s form of peacemaker. Newt was still sweet and supportive but more shy than he is now. Minho was still spunky but in a more childish way... and Gally... he still picked fights with Thomas every second he had. Even after you were all brainwashed and shoved into the Glade, you guys all remained the amazing friends that you were back then.”
The gang smiled, falling into peaceful silence as they enjoyed the peace and quiet for a change. Frypan drifted off into a slumber within five minutes. Fawn lay down on her left side, her head spinning from all that had happened that day.
She felt tears prick her eyes as she recalled Gally and Chuck still lying dead in that lab hundreds of miles away. She felt sick thinking back to the griever attack, their dozens of eyes still appearing in her vision. She rolled around, trying to find a comfortable position but eventually gave up when Janson returned and escorted them to the lunch room to get some food.
She felt her stomach grumble at the mention of food but then it turned into protest when the smell of fresh food struck her nose. That was strange... that was the first time food did not sound good to her.
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