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Nighttime had overtaken the grey sky and inky black bled across every inch of the heavens above, but Thomas couldn’t sleep.
He lay at the back seat of the van Jorge had found, alongside Brenda, who was sound asleep and breathing steadily. The space was small and cramped, making him feel stuck and trapped between the walls and seats in an uncomfortable, claustrophobic way. Even the air felt suffocating – it was thick and heavy, filling his lungs like poison.
He couldn’t stop thinking about Minho. They’d been so close. So close to getting their best friend back.
How did this happen? And how were they going to get him back? To infiltrate first the Last City and then WCKD? Were they going to make it?
He wondered if Vince had been right. If maybe risking his, Newt’s and Frypan’s lives just for Minho was a step too far. Hell, they didn’t even have any confirmation that their friend was still alive – he could have been dismembered and torn apart for examination, for all that mattered.
And if somehow he lost Newt along the way, too… it’d be too much. What if this really was the wrong decision and he was risking too much for the sake of one man who might not even still be breathing?
Because – god, he loved Minho so much, but he loved Newt too. He couldn’t imagine a world without the boy standing by him and supporting him, couldn’t imagine a world where Newt didn’t exist and sneaked smiles at him when no one else was watching.
The car was suffocating.
Forcing himself up before his mind spiralled into overdrive, Thomas pulled himself from the seat and swung the door gently open. It rattled in place before coming to a halt silently. Looking behind him, he saw no movement and proceeded to swing his legs out of the vehicle before finally hoisting himself to the ground.
The air outside was cooler, crisp with the night chill, and undoubtedly lighter than inside. He inhaled deeply, though it only made his fingers tingle and did little to ease the stress coiling in his stomach. Carefully, he shut the door behind him and began to walk a small loop around the van, trying to gather his thoughts before they splintered apart.
He was halfway around when he heard it.
It was originally ignorable, but then it grew louder.
A tiny, small sniffle and whimper, followed by an angry choke of pain. Thomas’s heart dropped at the sound. It was coming from behind the van, close to where they’d built the fireplace the previous night. But he’d seen Brenda in the van, just like Frypan, and it definitely didn’t sound like it came from Jorge.
Newt.
Thomas’s heart ached. Of course – did he really think he’d be the only one up at night freaking out over Minho’s capture? Honestly, it made perfect sense that Newt was panicking more over it than Thomas, considering how long he’d known Minho.
He rounded the corner, fully expecting himself to see Newt crouched on a log quietly crying but still and quiet.
Instead he saw his best friend curled up by the dead fire, his sleeve pulled down to his elbow, arm trembling as his other one gripped a folding knife that dripped with a dark, wet substance.
And that wasn’t even half of it.
His other arm – the one with the sleeve pulled away was dark and discoloured with thick, blackened veins clinging to his pale skin like the angry roots of a tree. It bulged and swelled on his skin, which was punctured in several areas and oozing with discoloured black blood.
Thomas’s heart stopped.
“Newt?” he choked out, voice breaking and trembling.
Newt’s head snapped up, his eyes darting across Thomas’s face, pure panic flooding his face as his mouth fell agape with shock.
“Tommy!” he gasped, voice strangled, “I– I wasn’t doing anyth–”
“Drop the knife, Newt.”
Newt paused, his eyes scanning Thomas’s features, hands beginning to shake harder as a tear fell down his already wet, shiny face. “I–I…”
“I said drop it!” Thomas commanded, his voice shaking almost as hard as his body was. He marched over, the world swimming, his legs slow and almost resistant to the air around him as though he was walking on a seabed. It wasn’t a good kind of slow – it was like those scenes in movies he didn’t recall watching where everything just paused – time just paused, people just paused – and everything wasn’t happening fast enough.
When he was finally in front of his friend, he grabbed Newt’s wrist and yanked it away from him, tearing the knife from his weak grip and throwing it as far as his strength allowed him to. The blade hit the earth only two feet away.
It happened in a second, but it was long enough for Thomas to see just how much blood there was on the silvery metal – the rim was coated in the discoloured oily substance, glittering angrily.
What had Newt been thinking?
“What were you thinking?” he shrieked, voice breaking as hot tears finally began tracking down his face, bleeding across his skin, “why would you – why would do that? You could have killed yourself – you could’ve–” he paused, desperately sucking in a breath as he scanned Newt’s face and arm.
Newt’s bleeding arm. Newt’s infected bleeding arm.
His friend looked up at him with two broken, glassy eyes.
“Maybe that would’ve been for the best.”
Thomas’s heart shattered and his knees went weak – his body sank to the ground in front of Newt as a wash of helplessness flooded his body. He tried to hide his trembling and failed, sensing Newt’s worried gaze on him – the irony wasn’t lost on him.
“I’m so sorry, Newt. I’m so- I’m so sorry,” he paused and reached out to touch his friend’s shaking shoulder, then stopped short.
“Show me your arm, Newt,” Thomas said firmly, tugging at the sleeve of Newt’s shirt, which had been once again pulled down, though there were a few streaks of dark red speckled against the fabric. Shaking his head and then giving up, Newt sighed shakily and his eyes trailed down toward his arm.
“You know what you saw,” was all he said.
“I want to see again,” Thomas breathed, the lie bitter on the tip of his tongue, “I wanna see how much… you have left.” At the words, his stomach panged and nausea flooded his throat. Newt pinched his eyes shut and then inhaled, reaching down and fiddling with the corner of his sleeve for a second, buying time.
Thomas far from hated him for it.
Then Newt pulled it back up again and held it out for his friend to look. There was something in his eyes that screamed see, don’t touch, and Thomas heeded the warning though he wouldn’t have had the stomach to touch it anyway.
He doubted it originally would’ve looked too bad – there was still the scar of a scratch mark one of the cranks in the tunnel must’ve left, but other than that the veins weren’t bulging, just visibly blackened and dark. But Newt had created cuts and marks down the skin and wet, oily blackness oozed from each wound and festered around the crust of each one.
“Was hoping that if I got rid of enough, then… maybe It’d give me something, or at least spare me some time to rescue Minho,” he laughed bitterly, “if I had enough weapons, I very well might’ve chopped the entire bloody thing off.”
The old tears that had grown cold on Thomas’s cheeks were replaced by a fresh wash of hot ones.
“Newt, I– I’m sorry. You .. you should’ve said something, I could’ve helped – we could’ve helped.”
“By doing what exactly?”
Thomas paused, “we could try harvest the serum.”
Newt shook his head softly. “There’s no way to do it, Tommy. Brenda and Jorge know jack about this and Mary… even if she was here, it’d take way too much time off our schedule.”
“I don’t accept that,” Thomas choked out, his voice growing desperate and strangled, “there has to be something we can do. I can’t just sit here and watch you die and try to cut the virus out of yourself; do you know how much it kills me?!”
He was crying again – sobbing, more like, his shoulders shaking and his chest heaving. In that moment, he felt pathetic; newt was dying and he was the one who needed to be comforted.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, “I’m so sorry. I love you, Newt. I love you so much.” he leaned in and hugged his friend; hugged him tight until he was certain he’d lost his breath and had crushed it out of Newt.
“S’okay, Tommy,” he heard Newt whisper.
Thomas nodded into Newt’s chest, “We’ll try, I promise, and please, please don’t touch that knife again. And… if there’s anything I can do, then just tell me. I’ll be there for you. You’re not alone here.”
Problem was that the five of them were all alone here, stranded out in the open hunting down a city that might not exist – Thomas had never felt more alone. But he couldn’t say that or even accept it, so..
At least they had each other; it was all they had.
“Just… stay?” Newt breathed, his arms wrapping tighter around Thomas.
“I will never leave you, Newt,” Thomas whispered, voice dripping with desperation rather than the certainty he’d hoped for, “never.”
“Thank you, Tommy,” Newt murmured, voice thick with emotion.
Thomas wanted to tell Newt that he shouldn’t thank him, rather Thomas should be thanking Newt for everything, for being the friend Thomas would never have been. But he supposed that was something that should have been saved for later.
All he had to do was to keep that promise. That he would never let Newt go and they would never be apart.
It was the only hope he had left.