Teresa recovered, took a deep breath, and positioned herself defensively, aiming her weapon at the other sections of the room. Thomas, hurting all over, forced himself to his feet, looking around to make sure he didn’t suffer another surprise attack.
There were no signs of the remaining two Cranks—they must’ve hidden behind one of the many couches or chairs clustered around the rec room. Thomas pulled off his backpack to look for syringes while his friends carefully made their way from chair to chair, couch to couch, peeking behind them. So far nothing. Then Teresa screamed, and just as Thomas looked in her direction he saw her disappear behind a couch, dropping with a hard thump.
Thomas ran for her, his heart erupting into a rapid drumbeat. He’d left everything behind him—his pack, all the instruments of death it contained. It felt as if the air solidified, slowing his speed. No other sound had come from Teresa’s direction, and Aris and Rachel were too far away to help.
He reached the wall, slammed his shoulder into it as he looked behind the sofa, saw Teresa on the ground, a man’s arm wrapped around her throat. She fought him with both hands, to no avail. He squeezed and squeezed, making her eyes bulge and terrible sounds escape her open mouth. Choking, gurgled sounds.
“Let her go!” Thomas shouted. Words would mean nothing to this Crank—a bald man, sweaty, a huge gash across his forehead. Dr. Leavitt.
It was Dr. Leavitt.
Blood mixed with sweat, dripped down into his eyes, which were red-veined and fierce. Teresa, struggling, reached for something on the floor, just beyond her fingers.
The gun.
Thomas picked it up, felt the life of his best friend fleeing as if through the air, leaving her rapidly in the arms of death. He’d never actually fired a pistol before, worried about his ability to aim. Placing his finger lightly on the trigger, he returned his attention to Teresa and the Crank once known as Leavitt. The man hadn’t relented, his arm a closing vise of flesh, and Teresa’s skin had turned a frightening shade of purple.
Thomas threw aim to the wind and jumped on top of them, landing stomach to stomach on Teresa, her face mere inches from his. Their eyes met, sharing the pain and fear. Leavitt used his other arm to swat at Thomas, his meaty palm slapping him in the side of the head. Thomas pulled up his hand, sliding the tip of the gun along the floor beside Teresa’s body. Up and up, past her ear, to the Crank’s head, to the side of it, to the temple.
Leavitt’s face suddenly transformed, losing all its malice and empty hate, turning into a pitiful, childlike plea. His arm’s grip on Teresa loosened.
“Please,” the man whimpered, “please don’t hurt me.”
Thomas pulled the trigger and ended it. The shot was like a crack of thunder, the crack of the world splitting. His ears ringing, he grabbed Teresa and pulled her off her dead attacker. Thomas had never much liked him anyway.
She trembled in his arms, a rare show of weakness after such a terrifying ordeal. He wrapped himself around her and held her tight. Aris came up behind him, put a hand on his shoulder, but Thomas didn’t turn to look.
“Where’s the other one?” he asked, barely able to speak. “There should be one more.”
“Rachel got him,” Aris replied. “Don’t worry. They’re all dead.”
Thomas held on to Teresa as if he’d fall to the center of the world otherwise. “I can’t take much more of this.”
Rachel responded from somewhere nearby.
“Six,” she said. “There’s only six left.”
—
By lunchtime they’d killed the remaining Cranks. Compared to the nightmare of what they’d had to do in the rec room, the rest were a piece of cake. All asleep, their lives ended with the stab of a needle and the flow of poison.
And that was it.
The Purge was over.
231.06.07 | 12:45 p.m.
What a world Thomas lived in. Illness, death, betrayal. His friends subjected to cruel trials that might never mean a thing. A world baked, lying in ruin. A month ago, he’d helped murder more than a dozen human beings in a matter of hours. And every day since, he’d lived in a pit of self-loathing and guilt, avoiding his friends at all costs. Even living in a complex bursting to the seams with so-called Psychs, no amount of therapy had helped him cope with the horrors of the Purge. Nor would it ever.
He was changed. At least he understood that.
He’d even stayed away from the observation room lately, too depressed to watch the maze. But today, he’d forced himself to come in and catch up. The first thing he noticed was a display that showed Alby and Newt walking beside one of the huge Glade walls, but something was off. Newt leaned into Alby, who had an arm draped across Newt’s back, helping him stand. Newt could only put his full weight on one leg. He lurched with each step, his face grimacing in pain.
Thomas sat down at the controls, took a moment to settle his mind on how to go about what he wanted to do. Then he started the meticulous process of finding the correct camera angles he’d need to put together a story.
What in the world had happened to Newt?
—
Less than two hours later, Thomas had spliced together a series of camera clips from various beetle blades, the closest to a continuous feed that he could accomplish. It showed a tale that just about broke Thomas’s heart. On the large display screen in the middle of the wall, he started it up again from the beginning.
Early in the morning of the previous day, Newt had been totally fine. He said goodbye to Minho and the other Runners—it was Newt’s day off from running, apparently. After the different groups disappeared around their respective corners, Newt spent some time walking around the Glade, checking on the various sections as if everything in the world was normal with him—as normal as things get living inside a giant maze. He spoke to Winston over at the Blood House, then chatted with Zart by the small cornfield in the Gardens. Newt even laughed a little, once slapping Zart on the back as if he’d just told a great joke.