Stolen [The Maze Runner Fanfiction]

XLIX. Ready or Not

"Rise and shine, everybody up." Minho shouts from the bedroom doorway. I'm already awake, and have been, for hours now. I woke up early in the morning when Minho left, then couldn't go back sleep. So, I had laid there awake, the blood curdling screams of the griever's latest victim haunting my mind. At least it hadn't been me. The one person a night thing had given me a thought. This was on purpose. The doors hadn't suddenly broken, no, the creators, whoever they were, wanted this to happen.

"I don't want to exist today, think I'll try again tomorrow." Kate whines, rolling onto her stomach and pulling a pillow over her head. I couldn't agree more.

"Too bad, I can still see you." Clint says, poking her in the ribs. She curves out of the way, ripping the pillow off of her head to smack him with it.

"Alright let's get going, we have a lot of people to convince." Newt says, coming in behind Minho. Always the party crasher. I'm not looking forward to asking all of the gladers to risk their lives on a plan we aren't even sure about, so I change the subject.

I yawn, sliding out of my sleeping bag. As soon as I'm out the cold air reaches my skin, making me shiver. I pull Minho's jacket tighter around me, and hug my knees to my chest. The glade is never cold? Just another effect of losing the sun I guess

Before long we head down in a somber mood, prepared to eat breakfast for the last time. I'm surprised when I see Alby already sitting there, I didn't know he was out of bed? A large white bandage is wrapped over half his head, covering his wound. He recovered quickly.

"Hey Alby, how ya feeling?" I ask, sliding in across from him.

"Like klunk." He responds, barely glancing up from his food.

"Well we have good news, we might have found a way out." I say, leaving out the part about how half of us will probably die getting there. Alby's eyes suddenly snap up to meet mine, filled with an intensity I've never seen before.

"We can't go back." He says, violently shaking his head. "We can't go back, that's why I burned the maps."

"Well good thing we hid the real ones then." Newt says flatly, sitting down across from us. I'm not sure what's more shocking, the fact that Newt doesn't care, or the fact that Alby did it in the first place.

"Wait you did that?" Thomas asks. Newt must've just let him out of the slammer.

Alby nods miserably, "then I slammed my head on the table so you'd think it was someone else."

"So Thomas, how was your second stay in the slammer?" Kate asks, sliding in beside me, and I for one, am more than grateful for the subject change. I can't believe Alby would do something like that? How bad was whatever he remembered? I don't think I want to know.

"Boring." Thomas answers, shooting Kate a glare.

"At least you had someone to talk to." Kate says. I'm still a little weirded out by the fact that he and Teresa can talk telepathically, and I kind of wonder how it works.

"Yeah.... Well, sort of anyway." Thomas answers, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. I notice him glancing at Teresa, and wonder what they are saying. Their 'trick' is really starting to bother me.

"We should get going." Minho says, looking out the door. We all snap our heads in his direction, giving him dirty looks; no one wants to think about what has to be done today. "I'm just saying."