A hiss of static. The lead guard’s voice, sharp and clipped in his ear. Distant. The world was two inches from his face, where Janson’s fingers were a skeletal clamp on his wrist. The man’s eyes, milky with shock, struggled to find him.
“Stephen…” The name was a bubble of blood and air. A ghost of a memory Thomas couldn’t grasp. Then, closer, a desperate secret. “She didn’t know, Stephen. Find the vault…”
Janson’s grip went limp. His head lolled to the side, the brief flicker of consciousness extinguished.
Find the vault.
The words were a brand on his brain. Before he could process them, a WCKD med-team swept past him, a blur of white and efficiency. Two medics, their faces obscured by polarized visors, immediately got to work, their movements silent and practiced. They didn’t speak to Thomas. They didn't seem to see him as anything other than an obstacle. One of them nudged his knee, a subtle pressure to move.
Thomas scrambled back, a puppet whose strings had just been cut. He rose to his feet, swaying. The medics had cut open Janson’s suit jacket and shirt with trauma shears, the sound of tearing fabric an obscene violation. They were applying a bio-foam sealant to the wound, the hiss of the canister loud in the sudden quiet.
“Pressure’s dropping. Let’s get him on the gurney. Now.”
A collapsible anti-grav gurney hummed to life, unfolding beside the body. As they prepared to move Janson, Thomas turned.
And the world rushed back in.
His friends hadn’t moved. They were twenty feet away, a tableau of disbelief carved from the smoke and ruin. Minho’s face was stone, his arms crossed tight against his chest, a dam holding back a flood of rage. Gally looked like he’d been slapped; his mouth was a grim, hard line, his hand resting on the grip of his pistol. Vince and Jorge were behind them, expressions of pure, baffled fury. Teresa stood slightly apart, her pistol still held loosely at her side, her face pale and unreadable. Her eyes were fixed on Thomas.
But it was Newt’s face that shattered him. The warmth, the unshakeable belief that had been Thomas’s anchor through every hell, was gone. In its place was a hollowed-out confusion so deep it looked like physical pain. Newt’s gaze wasn’t on Thomas, but on the WCKD guards who stood in a rigid semi-circle around him, a pristine wall of black armor separating him from everything he’d ever known.
“Thomas.” Newt’s voice was quiet, but it carried. It was the only sound that mattered. “What is this?”
Thomas opened his mouth, but no words came out. What could he say? *I don’t know. He’s my father. He just told me to find a vault. I think my name is Stephen.* Each thought was more insane than the last. The confession felt like a cliff edge, and his friends were on the other side of the chasm.
“Fall back, Director,” one of his guards said, his voice a disembodied rasp. “We have the Principal.”
Principal. Not Janson. Not Dad. *Principal*. It sounded worse. More official. More WCKD.
“No,” Thomas rasped, shaking his head. He took a stumbling step toward his friends. Toward Newt. The guard nearest to him moved with him, a perfect, synchronized shadow. A cage.
Gally took a step forward, his face contorting in disgust. “Get away from him, you freak.” The insult was aimed at the guard, but his eyes were burning a hole through Thomas. “This is some kind of trick. Janson’s playing one last game.”
“He’s my…” The word died on his tongue. He couldn’t say it again. Saying it once had broken the world. Saying it again would grind the pieces to dust.
“Your *what*, Thomas?” Minho’s voice was sharp as broken glass. “The 'Rat Man'? The bastard who put us in the Maze, who watched our friends die? Who had me tortured for months? What is he to you?”
Each question was a blow. Thomas flinched, his eyes darting from Minho’s fury to Janson’s still form being strapped onto the gurney. The medics were hooking up IV lines, their movements a whirlwind of controlled panic.
“They’re taking him,” Gally stated, raising his pistol. “That’s not happening.”
Before Gally could aim, the WCKD guard who had been shadowing Thomas moved with impossible speed. He didn’t draw a weapon. He simply stepped in front of Gally, his posture a solid threat. “Stand down.”
“Or what?” Gally snarled. “You’ll shoot me?”
“Sir,” the guard said, turning his helmeted head slightly toward Thomas. The deference was still there, but now it was a question. An offer. *Give the order.*
The power was a toxic surge in his veins. He could end this. He could have them all restrained. He could have them all silenced. The thought made him sick.
“No,” Thomas said, his voice cracking. “Stand down, all of you.” He looked at Gally, then at his guard. “Everyone. Just… stop.”
He pushed past the guard, closing the distance to his friends. The air grew thick with their betrayal. They smelled of sweat, gunpowder, and righteousness. He probably smelled like the enemy.
“Newt,” he pleaded, reaching for him.
Newt flinched back, a tiny, almost imperceptible movement, but it hit Thomas like a physical strike. He pulled his hand back as if burned.
“Don’t,” Newt whispered. His eyes were wide, glistening. “Tommy, just… tell me what’s happening. Tell me this is a nightmare.”
Behind him, the gurney levitated a few inches from the ground with a low hum. “Ready for transport, Director,” a medic called. “We need to move. His vitals are unstable.”
A choice. Stay and explain the inexplicable, or go and save the unforgivable.
He looked at Janson, pale and still, a tube down his throat, the man who had haunted his dreams now utterly helpless. Then he looked at the wreckage of his family, standing before him.
*She didn’t know. Find the vault.*
The words weren’t just a secret. They were a command. A legacy. The only thing his father had ever given him besides pain. He had to know what it meant.
“I can’t,” Thomas said, the words tearing from his throat. He wasn’t looking at Newt anymore, but at all of them, at the jury of his former life. “I can’t explain it. Not now. I have to go with him.”
The silence that followed was absolute. Minho just stared, his face wiped clean of emotion, a terrifying blankness taking its place. Gally let out a short, harsh laugh of disbelief.
“You’re choosing him,” Minho said. It wasn’t a question. It was a verdict.
“No! I’m not choosing anyone.” Thomas’s voice rose, bordering on hysterical. “I just… I need to understand.”
“Understood what?” Minho shot back, echoing his own question to Janson what felt like a lifetime ago. “His lies?”
Thomas’s gaze flickered to Teresa. She hadn’t moved, her expression still a carefully constructed mask. But her eyes followed his. He saw a flicker of something—fear? Guilt? He didn’t know. Janson’s voice echoed in his head. *She didn’t know.* What didn’t she know? That she was shooting his father?
The path forked. One way led back to ignorance and the simple comfort of his friends’ arms. The other led into the heart of the machine that had created him, chasing a ghost’s whisper.
He had already made his choice when he screamed for a med-team.
“Get them out of here,” Thomas said, turning to the lead guard. His voice was cold again. The Director’s voice. “Vince. Jorge. Get them all to the Berg. Take them somewhere safe. Away from the city.”
Vince stepped forward, his face thunderous. “We don’t take orders from WCKD.”
“It’s not an order from WCKD,” Thomas said, meeting his gaze. He felt a thousand years old. “It’s from me.”
He turned his back on them. It was the hardest thing he’d ever done. Harder than running into the Maze. Harder than facing a Griever. He walked toward the floating gurney, the WCKD guards falling into formation around him. He didn’t look back, because if he looked back, he would stop. If he saw Newt’s face again, he’d crumble.
They moved through the rubble toward a dark, cavernous opening in a half-collapsed building—a loading bay. A slate-grey WCKD transport waited within, its ramp lowered, its interior bathed in the clean, sterile light of medical equipment.
As he stepped onto the ramp, he chanced one last look over his shoulder. Minho was staring at the ground, shaking his head slowly. Gally was looking away, his posture rigid with rejection. Vince and Jorge had their hands on their weapons, watching his guards with open hatred.
And Newt was just… watching him. His expression had changed. The hurt was still there, a gaping wound, but something else had taken root. A terrible, dawning clarity. He wasn't looking at "Tommy" anymore. He was looking at a stranger. Someone called Director. Someone named Stephen.
Thomas stepped into the transport. The ramp hissed shut behind him, sealing him inside with the steady beeping of heart monitors and the unconscious man who was his father. The dim light of the ruined city was cut off, replaced by the cold, blue-white glow of the cabin. He was safe. He was secure.
He had never felt so alone.