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It was to make sure Thomas wouldn’t escape, Janson said. As if he could. There was the plan to save all the other immunes, his friends who counted on him… And the fact that maybe… maybe his brain would be the answer to…
But the point was; he couldn’t escape, even if he wanted to. And Janson was probably very aware of that fact. So, there was no other explanation than a sick revenge, a last chance to make Thomas suffer before killing him. Or it was the Flare that had completely rotted Janson inside. Or maybe Janson was insane from the beginning.
Thomas resisted as best as he could. He knew he couldn’t escape this, his fate was sealed, but even as his wings were pinned down, he screamed, punching and kicking everything and everyone in his reach, a beast in a rampage.
The knife eventually came down. The last thing Thomas remembered was a gut-wrenching sound coming out from his mouth and the feeling of his world falling down on itself before everything turned to black.
Everything was going well in Paradise. It had only been a few weeks, maybe a month, but everyone was adapting well to this new life. Cabins were being built, food supplies were getting bigger, friend groups were being formed, everyone was getting a role in this new society… Overall, it was good. The immunes were finally living a life free from the threat of Wicked and the Cranks. So, despite traumas, injuries and all the other stuff, everyone was going well.
Everyone except Thomas.
Ever since losing part of his right wing, a dark hole had formed inside of him, consuming all of his happiness and joy, leaving him as only a shadow of his past self. Not to mention the constant pain.
He couldn’t look at himself in mirror, the vision of his severed limb painted a horrifying portrait, one he didn’t want to face in fear of only being able to see himself as a disfigured monster.
Not being able to fly also took a toll on him. Well, he could still fly… just not as well and not as fast as before. After he recovered from Janson last evil act, the medjacks had tried to convince him to fly at least five minutes a day to keep his wings strong and help him find a new balance. But struggling at something he used to be good at only deterred him from trying again, so he stopped flying altogether.
But the worst thing to deal with was the pain.
They said it was fully healed. But none of them had lost a limb. Every day, his wing hurt, as if it was still there, being shredded into parts, over and over again. They called it ghost pain, Thomas called it a pain in the ass.
On top of that, his wings were aching from the lack of exercise, which made his whole body ache really. Someday, moving was so painful he stayed in bed the whole day. Minho always tried to help him as much as possible, bringing him food, offering massages, but Thomas declined every time. That didn’t deter his best friend, who kept bringing him food on bad days and trying to talk to him, which often resulted in Minho talking to himself. Thomas thought he would eventually get bored, but surprisingly, Minho did not.
Minho was another thing to deal with. For some unknown reasons, ever since his wing was clipped, Thomas often couldn’t bare to be around Minho, but was missing him all the same, even if his best friend was right next to him. During those times, even hugging him wasn’t enough, he needed to make one with his friend, make a nest inside Minho’s heart…
This frightened Thomas, which only made him want to get as far away from Minho as possible. His friend, of course, didn’t let that happen, adding to Thomas’s misery.
And right now was a perfect example of this. Thomas had gone to the beach, as far as possible from the small town they were building. His condition didn’t let him get far, obviously, but at least he was out of sight.
But of course, Minho was determined and found him pretty quickly.
“Hey shank, what are you doing here? Are you avoiding me or something?” Minho’s tone was playful, but Thomas knew that his friend perfectly knew that he was indeed trying to avoid him, which meant that Minho was trying to not get offended. Thomas hoped he would, so he could be left alone, finally. But at that thought, that part of him that craved Minho screamed.
“I’m trying to avoid everyone,” Thomas retorted, far from lying. Beside the pain that was bothering him, seeing everyone happy, flying whenever they could… it killed Thomas a little more each time.
Minho frowned but quickly changed his expression to a friendly one before laying down on the sand next to Thomas, his dark wings stretching out to not get crushed under him.
Thomas had always loved Minho’s wings. Their black colour was so deep, absorbing all the light. Except at that one spot at the end of his left wing where there was a feather stripped in different hues of blue. Thomas had a similar one, before it was clipped.
“Well, good thing I’m not everyone,” Minho joked, trying once more to light up Thomas’s mood. There was a time where Minho was able to make him laugh, to make him smile.
“I don’t get it,” Thomas said. “I don’t get how you are still not tired of me.”
“That simple, really,” Minho replied, looking up at the sky. “You’re my best friend. I won’t abandon you just because you’re in a bad phase.”
“That’s not a phase and you know it. There’s no way it’s going to get better.”
Minho sat up at that and looked down at Thomas. “You think that because you have given up. But I haven’t. Every day, I try to find a solution to help you. I talk to so many people that might know how to help your situation.”
“And where has that gotten you? Bet you haven’t found anything.” Thomas knew he was being a dick, but how could he not. Minho was holding onto hopes and dreams.
“When did you become so defeatist?”
“I don’t know, maybe when we lost so many people during the trials?” Thomas started, sarcasm coating his voice. “Or when we lost Newt. Teresa. Or when I lost my wing, I don’t know.”
“You’re being such a shuckface right now, and I don’t deserve it,” Minho said, still smiling despite everything. “Especially when I might have found someone that might help you.”
“I bet they could do more than the medjacks.”
Minho rolled his eyes. “Could you at least try? I’m sure Aya is going to help you.”
“If you insist.”
Minho did, indeed, insist. That was how Thomas found himself in front of one of the earliest cabins of Paradise. Aya, the oldest survivor of their little community, according to Minho, was living there with her wife Veronica. From what Minho heard, Aya had some answers to give them.
It was Veronica who greeted them. She was a beautiful woman with tall white wings and years older than them, but still young. Around 40 years old, maybe? Thomas couldn’t be sure. Her and Aya must have been along the first immunes.
Aya was inside, busy stitching some fabric together. Since everyone had a role in Paradise, Thomas assumed Aya’s was to make clothes for everyone. The very shirt he was wearing might have been made by her.
“Oh, welcome!” she said once she spotted them. “You must be Minho and Thomas, Veronica told me about you. Please come sit.”
Aya’s voice was warm and welcoming. Her wings were white, just like Veronica’s. They sat down at the table while Aya put her work aside.
“I have heard you lost part of your wing, is that correct?” she asked, turning to Thomas.
“I mean, it was clipped by a mad man, but yeah.”
“Can I see?”
Thomas shrugged and extended his right wing to Aya.
“No, I need to see your wings as a whole.”
“But why?” Thomas asked. He already hated talking about his wings as it was, and he mostly kept them, closed to avoid any questions or wandering looks of pity. Showing them willingly was something he no longer did.
“I need to look at something.”
“Come on, Thomas,” Minho pleaded. “Let her do it.”
Reluctantly, Thomas turned around so his back was facing Aya and extended his wings. The stretch immediately brought some relief, but then he tensed again when he felt Aya’s hands on his feathers.
Catching on Thomas’s growing anxiety, Minho took his hands into his, gently stroking them with his thumb. Thomas tried to focus on that sensation instead of the hands on his wings.
“Your soulmate feather was cut off,” Aya stated after a while.
“My what?!”
Aya finally let go of his wings, allowing Thomas to turn back to face her.
“Everyone has a soulmate. Sometimes even more than one. It’s someone with who you form a link with forever. It’s the strongest bond there is. Most people assume soulmates are always romantic, but that isn’t true. Some can even be siblings. Veronica and I are soulmates. Romantic soulmates. You can see it in our feather.”
Veronica moved closer to Aya and bother women extend their wings. Amongst the pure white of their feather, there was one pink and orange one, each at the end of their opposite wing, mostly hidden by their other feathers when their wings were closed.
“Yeah, but everyone has a feather like that,” Thomas argued, confused by all of this.
“Of course, but only your soulmate has the same pattern as you on this feather. It is unique to every soulmate combination,” Aya explained. “Soulmates were forgotten by most when the flare hit, because so many people died. Some, like me and Veronica, we’re lucky enough to have found each other.”
Both boys went silent, turning to look at each other. Thomas could see in his friend’s eyes that he just had the same thought has him.
“Cutting a soulmate feather is very painful,” Aya continued, oblivious to the boys’ silent communication. “It cuts off the link to your soulmate, creating a lot of distress and pain, both physical and emotional. I have been told it was your case, wasn’t it?”
Thomas nodded, still looking at Minho. Could they really be…
“Is there something we can do?” Minho asked, desperation in his voice.
“Unless we know for sure who's Thomas’s soulmate is, and if they are still alive, there’s nothing we can do,” Aya replied, sadly.
“It’s Minho,” Thomas said, looking down. “If what you said is true, then my soulmate is Minho. We had the same feather.”
“Oh, it’s great then!” Veronica intervened. “Then you just have to form another type of bond.”
“Like how?” Minho asked, but Thomas was already standing up, ready to leave. “Hey, where are you going?”
“Away.” That was the last thing Thomas said before crossing the doorway and running as far as his body let him. He knew what Aya was about to say and he didn’t want to hear it, didn’t want to acknowledge it.
Surprisingly, it was Jorge who found him. Thomas didn’t even know where he was. Somewhere lost in the forest surrounding Paradise.
“There you are, hermanos.”
“Leave me alone,” Thomas immediately said. Knowing the man, he would say anything to convince Thomas to come back. And he would succeed.
“I would like to, but Minho would kill me,” he joked. “He wants to see you.”
“And I don’t.”
“What,” Jorge laughed. “You don’t want to see your soulmate?”
Thomas lifted his head at that. “You know?”
“Yeah, Minho told me. Look, I don’t want to get into your stuff, hermanos, but I think you should talk with your friend. He… Well… you should see for yourself.”
Panic took hold of Thomas’s entire body. No, Minho didn’t.
Thomas ran again; despite the protest his body was screaming at him. He needed to reach Minho, maybe he hadn’t done it yet, maybe Thomas could still talk him out of if…
Not knowing how he did it, he was in front of the tent he was sharing with Minho. There was no sign of his friend. Looking around desperately, he tried to think of where else Minho could be.
But before he could settle on his next action, he saw Minho approaching. His usual tan skin was pale and his smirk was weaker than normal. Thomas immediately understood that his friend had done it. He had clipped the end of his left wing, the one with his soulmate feather.
“Are you shucking stupid?!” Thomas screamed, running towards his friend, his body shaking by the anger and despair he was feeling. If there was someone that he never wanted to experience what he went through, it was Minho. And Minho just did it, for what? For him? Thomas didn’t deserve it. “Why would you do that?!”
Minho didn’t reply right away. When Thomas reached him, he simply took the angry boy in his arms. All of a sudden, everything felt into place. The world was rebuilding around Thomas, the clouds made ways for rays of sunshine… He was finally breathing after all this time.
Thomas stood there, taking in all those feelings, as Minho continued hugging him, unbothered by the fact Thomas wasn’t hugging him back. Thomas didn’t know how long they stood there, frozen in time. All his anger had disappeared, but his concerns hadn’t.
“Why… Why did you do it…” He asked, his voice wet with unshed tears.
Minho loosened the hug, but did not let go of Thomas. He kept holding on to him, at close distance, but enough so he could stare at each other.
“Because I love you, Thomas.”
“W-what?”
“I’ve been in love with you the whole time. I even told you back in Denver!”
A vision of Minho declaring “Remember that I love you” in a sappy voice before disappearing in the wall protecting the city came into Thomas’s mind.
“But… you were joking!” Thomas argued, tears finally falling down his face. He couldn’t believe it. Yeah, they were soulmates, but as Aya said, soulmates could be platonic. And Thomas, as far as his memories went, never really got what he wanted in life. So Minho had to be joking.
“I wasn’t!” Minho insisted. “Sure, I tried to play it cool, because I’m a dumb shank who was scared of not having his feelings reciprocated. But I love you, Thomas. I’m in love with you. And knowing you are my soulmate, but that we lost our bond because of shucking Rat Man, seeing you do depress and in pain for the past month killed me. I needed to do everything I could to help you. It was the easiest decision in my life.”
Thomas was full on crying, sobs so strong they forced him on his knees. Minho followed him, gently stroking his back.
“I-I love y-you too,” Thomas sobbed, struggling to form words. “E-ever s-since that n-night in the M-maze…”
“Yeah, same…”
They stayed like this, waiting for Thomas to calm down. Thomas couldn’t help but notice Minho also had tears in his eyes, but his smile was so bright, far from his usual smirk.
“I love you,” Thomas said once more after finding his voice again. He wanted to say it clearly. He had wanted to say it for so long. “And you’re so dumb for clipping your wings willingly, but I understand. I would have done the same…”
“Yeah. It sucks, but I don’t care. We don’t have to fly anyway. We can run, like we did in the Maze together. It’s our thing.”
Thomas smiled weakly. “Yeah… our thing.”
“Now…” Minho began, his cheeks going red by the second. “Can I… Can I kiss you now? It’s not like I’ve been waiting to do it since the Maze, but I kinda did and-”
Thomas pressed his lips against Minho’s, shutting up his rambling.
If their hug had been magical, this kiss healed everything. From the black hole inside of Thomas, to the very core of their severed bond. He could feel the link, and the relief it brought him. Minho was inside him now, just as he was inside of Minho. Just like he had craved.
Their kissed deepened, hands wandering in locks of hair and available surface of skin. Thomas never wanted it to stop. But their lungs eventually needed air, and they parted, panting and smiling at each other, stars in their eyes.
“We’re going to be okay, I promise,” Minho told him before diving in for another kiss.