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It was the night before.
The great before.
There wouldn't be an after for a long time.
They both knew it.
So when night fell, realization dawned on them that the next morning, their ways would part drastically. Completely.
He willed the tears away that were threatening to spill from his eyes as he cautiously cracked his door open. WCKD didn't bother to lock their doors. They didn't have to. At this point, they were all here, voluntarily. Or at least that was what they had been indoctrinated with. Because contradictory, guards quipped with Launchers patrolled between their rooms at night and each and every subject caught outside after bedtime would be punished.
It was an open secret that everyone knew but no one dared to address. Newt had been in the punishment room many times, small and dark and left on his own for hours on end, driving him insane. Only left with his thoughts as company, something Newt had never been very good with. But he took the risk, gladly. If it only meant a few minutes alone with him before they were torn apart. Before he was going to be taken away. For good.
He listened closely until he was certain that the footsteps sounding from the hallway were going into the opposite direction that he was going to head. Having spent years in these corridors, between the bleak, white walls and the metal doors, Newt had memorized the cameras and their patterns, sneakily staying out of their periphery and only moving when they moved to point the other way.
His heart hammered in his chest and he half feared that someone would be able to hear the sound.
It took him nearly twenty minutes that way to make it to the other boy's door. The bronze plate read his name and number code. Alby, Subject A6.
His door wasn't locked either, so Newt opened it and slipped inside the instant he reached it. The sudden darkness inside as opposed to the neon brightness of the hallways took some time adjusting to. Time, that they didn't have, Newt reminded himself and took his first steps almost blind, trusting solely on the memories he had of the room from when he had visited it countless times before. Before.
“Alby?” he whispered, shocked by how loud his voice sounded in the utter silence of the room. Suddenly, he feared, that his friend might not even be here. Had they taken him already? Fearfully, Newt took another step into the room. When he concentrated enough, he could see outlines of furniture in the dim light that was seeping in from under the metal door.
“Alby” he repeated, more audibly this time, the word cutting through the darkness. He heard something move, the unmistakable sound of breathing. Relief washed over him as he took the last four steps towards the bed.
“Newt?” a voice asked, heavy with sleep.
“Yeah” Newt said, feeling tears sting in his eyes once more.
“What are you doing here? Are you crazy?” All signs of sleepiness had vanished from Alby's voice, replaced with worry.
Newt still couldn't make out more than vague shadows and silhouettes but it was more than enough to smile at the familiarity of the person in front of him. It could have been pitch black and he would know exactly what the face of the other boy looked like, his dark, expressive eyes, his furrowed brows, the soft lips...
“I know, I know” Newt hushed his friend, extending his hand, finding the other's by instinct. He laced their fingers together, naturally. “I wanted to say goodbye. There won't be time for that tomorrow.”
He was surprised by the sturdiness of his own voice while his insides felt weak and close to breaking away. He was barely holding on. In the darkness, Alby let out a ragged breath.
“You make it sound so final” Alby said, sadly. “We're gonna see each other again, in the Maze, remember?”
“Remembering is going to be exactly what scares me” Newt hiccoughed.
They had been told over and over what was going to be done to them. Their memories would be wiped clean of every bit of their personality. Every specification, gone. Every bit of their past, removed. What made them them would be only a feeling in the back of their minds. They wouldn't even recognize each other, despite growing up together.
Despite falling in love with one another.
Instead of responding, Alby simply wrapped his other hand around Newt's wrist, tugging him into the bed as well.
They settled against each other, comfortably, their legs entangled and Newt's head nestled snugly under Alby's chin, their intertwined hands between their chests, two heartbeats, completely in sync.
Well practised. It broke Newt's heart.
They cried, silently until Alby said the words that Newt had dreaded the most. The words, that would make their parting even worse, that would make everything so much more painful.
“I won't forget you” Alby promised, putting everything into those four words. Every unsaid sentence, every unfinished thought, every unexperienced thing. It was so heavy, that Newt thought his promise might crush him.
“Don't say that” he coaxed. “Don't say that, 'cause you will. It's what WCKD's gonna do. They're gonna make ya forget everything. Don't say that as if you have a choice.”
“But I won't forget you, swear it.”
“How” Newt said, accusatory. He knew it wasn't fair to blame Alby for his heartache, it was WCKD, it was what they had been signed up for the minute they were taken, it all leading up to those very moments where their memories, everything that happened, would be gone. He noticed he was squeezing Alby's hands, holding onto them. With everything he was, Newt wanted to make this moment last, to stop time from slipping away, for the inevitable to cease creeping closer and closer and closer.
When Alby captured Newt's lips with his, it did, for a heartbeat. Time stopped as they kissed. The ache inside of Newt was overwhelming but for a little while he could pretend not to notice. He could pretend that this was everything that existed in the world. Just Alby and him and the kiss they shared.
But when they broke apart, it was just the world again and time was moving on, mercilessly. There was no way of stopping it from running out.
“They say you never forget your first kiss” Alby husked and Newt felt his throat constrict. He brought a hand up to Alby's face, forcing himself to remember. The feel of the other boy's warm skin under his fingertips, the lingering sensation of lips on lips, the way his heart was longing for more. He wouldn't forget, either. How impossible to forget someone like Alby.
“I won't forget you, either” Newt breathed, cupping Alby's face in his hand. If only he could see the other. If only there was more time. If only.
“I know” was what Alby said, his own hand brought up to cover Newt's. He felt Alby turn his face, a chaste kiss placed on the inside of his hand, sending shivers down his spine.
They would never forget each other. There were years and years of memories, moments and mementos, living inside both of them, kept alive by their sheer will to remember.
Whatever was to happen to them, time would continue and so would those memories. Newt's heart was full of them, overflowing. Alby's fingers held onto his, tightly. They would never forget this. They would never forget each other.
And Newt believed it.