Her || The Maze Runner

Eight

"It's all her fault. She's gonna ruin us." Nick tutted as the door burst open, Nick, Alby and Newt all snapped their attention towards Mara who lingered in the doorway.

"Something to say?" She asked, her eyes digging into Nicks. This guy was bugging her, and she'd only known him an hour.

Nick stepped forward, but Newt held him back and spoke for him. "We were just talking about your incident with Gally yesterday." He started, walking over to Mara and squeezing her hand gently. "You hit him, and since Nicks back he's our leader again. He makes the choices around here."

Something about the way he spoke scared Mara, he seemed frightened. Which made Mara feel the same way. It didn't help that someone who seemed to have a grudge against her for no known reason was now going to decide her fate. She looked from Newt to Nick, who stood with Alby, a gigantic grin spread across his face.

"What are you going to do to me?" She asked, her voice was small and timid.

"Oh don't worry, I've already decided." He smiled evilly. What did he have in mind? What was he going to do to her? "I don't like you shank, and I definitely don't trust you. You're being banished."

Newt's eyes widened as he spun around to face Nick, even Alby looked shocked. Banished? It was pretty self-explanatory. She was going to be banished, and there was only one place she could have been banished to.

The maze.

"You're crazy. She hasn't done nothing to deserve banishment." Newt shook his head as he covered Mara from Nick's view. He was protecting her. At least someone was. She couldn't think straight, thinking about being trapped out in that maze at night, knowing she wasn't going to be as lucky as she was the last time that happened. It wasn't fair, he had been awake for less than three hours and he was banishing her. Who gave him that power?

A scream burst through the air, followed by another. It was coming from above them. What was going on? Mara threw her hands to her ears, but none of the boys did. Newt turned to her and said something but she couldn't hear him. He said it again, this time she heard him.

"It's Gally. That's the changing. I'm gonna go sort it out, then we'll figure something out. You're not getting banished. I promise."

With that he turned and ran up the stairs, Alby close behind. Followed by Nick, who stopped to look at Mara before he went with the other two boys. Mara was on their heels, not to see Gally but to get to her bed. To lie down, to figure out how she could save herself. There had to be a way, she definitely wasn't going down without a fight.

After kicking off her shoes she face planted her bed, her pillow digging into her face. She let out a long, strange groan into her pillow. What could she do to stop herself being banished on her second day in the bloody place?

"Mara?"

She turned her head to the left to see Newt kneeling next to her. A light smile grew on her face at the recognition of her name. Newt had called her by her name.

"I heard you from the other room." He said, a pained look across his face, making her smile fade. "I'm not going to let the shank banish you."

"And how do you plan on doing that?" She huffed, not a single idea ran through her head to save herself, it seemed hopeless. She didn't know why her hope had shrivelled so quickly, but it had and she couldn't bring any of it back.

"I have an idea. Trust me. You look exhausted, get some rest and I'll sort it out."

"But-" Newt interrupted her by holding his finger to her lips, telling her to stop talking. Giving in, Mara closed her eyes. Her eyelids were heavy, there was no chance of her opening them until she woke. She could feel herself falling asleep, deeper and deeper by the minute.

-

Voices, she could hear voices but all she could see was darkness. They were calling out to her, there were two of them, one boy and one girl.

"Mara. Nothing is going to happen to you. We won't let anything happen. You will not be banished." The girl told her, her voice was soft as she spoke.

"Nick is going to die Mara. Alby is going to become the new leader and call off the banishment." This was the boy speaking, his voice was gentle and calm. How did he know that? He couldn't, he was just a voice."Your in the running to be the final candidate Mara, along with the two of us."

"Don't worry, the three of us will be reunited soon, but, sadly, not all six of us.  One of them will die." It was the girl again. What did she mean? Who are the six? Who was going to die?

"But for now, you are going to wake up."

-

Mara sat up, staring at the wall opposite her. Her breathing was heavy, but who could blame her? She didn't know what was going on. All she could do was sit there, staring at that wall. Thousands of questions soared through her head about those voices, who they were, if she knew them. Something was going on, and she needed to know what that something was.

Slowly, she clambered out of her bed and shoved her shoes onto her feet, before running out of the room, down the scattered stairs and out of the building. She just wanted to get away, at that point she didn't care if she was banished, she just needed to get out.

"Mara!" Chuck shouted, he was running towards her. "Did you hear about Nick? He's gone crazy!"

Mara felt her heart skip a beat, what was going on? Was the dream really going to happen? Was Nick going to die.

"Chuck, tell me what's happened." She demanded, she needed to save him, even if he was going to banish her. He didn't deserve to die. She felt stupid for thinking he didn't deserve it, but he had been through enough lately.

"Well, a few minutes after you went into the homestead he came back out, Alby and Newt chasing him, calling him crazy and stupid. He was muttering something, I don't know what but Newt or Alby would." He shrugged.

"I'm gonna go find one of them, stay here Chuck." Mara told him, heading for the crowd of people surrounding the box.

She pushed past the group of boys until she stood at the middle of the crowd, Nick was stood on the edge of the box with both Newt and Alby pulling him back. He had a long piece of ivy tied around his thin waist. His mouth was moving, like Chuck said he was saying something but Mara couldn't tell what he was saying.

Two boys burst through the crowd to help Newt and Alby, they were the runners Mara had seen before, both looking exhausted and tired. But she couldn't focus on them at that moment, she had to save Nick.

She ran over to help them pull him up, but he stopped struggling as soon as he came into contact with her. The boy's head snapped in her direction, his grey eyes peircing into hers. His mouth opened as if to say something but clamped shut. Fear illumintated his eyes, sweat hung from his skin as he stood there, watching the girl before him.

"Wicked is good." He cried, and with one last look at Mara he jumped into the empty space, becoming nothing more than just another statistic of the dead.