فصل 34

CHAPTER 34

The next thirty seconds were a horrible, horrible thing for Thomas.

The Crank struggled. Spasmed. Choked and spat. Brenda held him while Thomas twisted the knife. Pushed it deeper. Life took its time as it drained from the man, as the light in his maddened eyes faded, as the grunts and the physical strain to hold on slowly quieted and stilled.

But finally, the Flare-infected man died, and Thomas fell backward, his whole body a tense coil of rusty wire. He gasped for breath, fought the sickening swell in his breast.

He’d just killed a man. He’d taken the life of another person. His insides felt full of poison.

“We need to go,” Brenda said, jumping to her feet. “There’s no way they didn’t hear all that racket. Come on.” Thomas couldn’t believe how unaffected she was, how quickly she’d moved on from what they’d done. But then again, they didn’t have much choice. The first sign of the other Cranks came echoing down the hall, like the sounds of hyenas bouncing through a canyon.

Thomas forced himself to stand, pushed down the guilt that threatened to consume him. “Fine, but no more of this.” First the head-eating silver balls. Now fighting Cranks in the darkness.

“What do you mean?”

He’d had enough of long black tunnels. Enough to last a lifetime. “I want daylight. I don’t care what it takes. I want daylight. Now.” * * *

Brenda didn’t argue. She guided him through several twists and turns and soon they found a long iron ladder leading toward the sky, out of the Underneath. The disturbing noises of Cranks lingered in the distance. Laughs and shouts and giggles. An occasional scream.

Moving the round manhole cover took some serious pushing, but it gave way and they climbed out. They found themselves standing in gray twilight, surrounded by enormously tall buildings in every direction. Broken windows. Garbage strewn over the streets. Several dead bodies lying about. A smell of rot and dust. Heat.

But no people. None living, anyway. Thomas felt a moment of alarm that some of the dead might be his friends, but that wasn’t the case. The scattered bodies were older men and women, and decay had already set in.

Brenda slowly turned in a circle, getting her bearings. “Okay, the mountains should be down that street.” She pointed, but it was impossible to tell because they didn’t have a clear view and the buildings hid the setting sun.

“You sure?” Thomas asked.

“Yeah, come on.”

As they set off down the long and lonely street, Thomas kept his eyes peeled, scanning every broken window, every alley, every crumbled doorway. Hoping to see some sign of Minho and the Gladers. And hoping not to see any Cranks.

They traveled until dark, avoiding contact with anyone. They did hear the occasional scream in the distance, or the sounds of things crashing inside a building now and then. Once, Thomas saw a group of people scurry across a street several blocks away, but they seemed not to notice him or Brenda.

Just before the sun disappeared completely for the day, they turned a corner and came into full view of the city’s edge, maybe another mile farther. The buildings ended abruptly, and behind them the mountains rose in all their majesty. They were several times bigger than Thomas would’ve guessed upon first glimpsing them a few days earlier, and were dry and rocky. No snowcapped beauties—a hazy memory from his past—in this part of the world.

“Should we go the rest of the way?” Thomas asked.

Brenda was busy looking for a place to hide. “Tempting, but no. First off, it’s too dangerous running around here at night. Second, even if we made it, there’d be no place for cover out there unless we made it all the way to the mountains. Which I don’t think we could do.” As much as Thomas dreaded spending another night in this wretched city, he agreed. But the frustration and worry over the other Gladers were eating away at his insides. He weakly replied, “Okay. Where should we go, then?” “Follow me.”

They wound up in an alley that ended in a large brick wall. At first Thomas thought it was a terrible idea to sleep in a place that had only one way out, but Brenda convinced him otherwise—Cranks would have no reason to enter the alley since it didn’t lead anywhere. Plus, she pointed out, there were several large, rusted trucks in which to hide.

They ended up inside one that looked like it had been torn apart for anything usable. The seats were tattered but they were soft, and the cab was big. Thomas sat behind the wheel, pushing the seat as far back as it would go. Surprisingly, he felt somewhat comfortable once settled. Brenda was just a couple of feet to his right, settling in herself. Outside, the darkness grew complete, and the distant sounds of active Cranks came through the broken windows.

Thomas was exhausted. Sore. In pain. Had dried blood all over his clothes. Earlier, he’d cleaned his hands, scrubbing them until Brenda yelled at him to quit wasting their water. But having the blood of that Crank on his fingers, on his palms … he couldn’t take it. His heart sank every time he thought of it, but he could no longer deny a terrible truth: if he hadn’t had the Flare before—a slim hope that Rat Man had lied—he’d surely caught it by now.

And now, sitting in the darkness, his head propped against the truck’s door, thoughts of what he’d done earlier came storming into his mind.

“I killed that guy,” he whispered.

“Yeah, you did,” Brenda responded, her voice soft. “Otherwise he would’ve killed you. Pretty sure that’s doing the right thing.” He wanted to believe it. The guy had been fully gone, consumed by the Flare. He probably would’ve died soon anyway. Not to mention he’d been doing everything possible to hurt them. To kill them. Thomas had done the right thing. But guilt still gnawed at him, crept through his bones. Killing another human. It wasn’t easy to accept.

“I know,” he finally responded. “But it was so … vicious. So brutal. I wish I could’ve just shot him from a distance with a gun or something.” “Yeah. Sorry it had to go down that way.”

“What if I see his nasty face every night when I go to sleep? What if he’s in my dreams?” He felt a surge of irritation at Brenda for making him stab the Crank—maybe unwarranted when he really considered how desperate they’d been.

Brenda shifted in her seat to face him. Moonlight illuminated her just enough that he could see her dark eyes, her dirty but pretty face. Maybe it was bad, maybe he was a jerk. But looking at her made him want Teresa back.

Brenda reached out, took his hand and squeezed it. He let her, but he didn’t squeeze back.

“Thomas?” She said his name even though he was looking right at her.

“Yeah?”

“You didn’t just save your own skin, ya know. You saved mine, too. I don’t think I could’ve beaten that Crank by myself.” Thomas nodded but didn’t say anything. He hurt inside for so many reasons. All his friends were gone. Dead, for all he knew. Chuck was definitely dead. Teresa was lost to him. He was only halfway to the safe haven, sleeping in a truck with a girl who would eventually go crazy, and they were surrounded by a city full of bloodthirsty Cranks.

“You asleep with your eyes open?” she asked him.

Thomas tried to smile. “No. Just thinking about how much my life sucks.”

“Mine does, too. Sucks big-time. But I’m glad I’m with you.”

The statement was so simple and so sweet it made Thomas close his eyes, squeeze them shut. All the pain inside him transformed into something for Brenda, almost like what he’d felt for Chuck. He hated the people who’d done this to her, hated the disease that had made all this happen, and he wanted to make it right.

He finally looked at her again. “I’m glad, too. Being alone would suck even worse.” “They killed my dad.”

Thomas lifted his head, surprised by the sudden shift in conversation. “What?” Brenda nodded slowly. “WICKED. He tried to stop them from taking me, screamed like a lunatic as he attacked them with … I think it was a wooden rolling pin.” She let out a small laugh. “Then they shot him in the head.” Tears glistened in her eyes, sparkling in the faint light.

“You’re serious?”

“Yeah. I saw it happen. Saw the life go out of him before he even hit the floor.” “Oh, man.” Thomas searched for words. “I’m really … sorry. I saw maybe my best friend in the world get stabbed. He died right in my arms.” He paused again. “What about your mom?” “She hadn’t been around for a long time.” She didn’t elaborate, and Thomas didn’t push. Didn’t really want to know.

“I’m so scared of going crazy,” she said after a long minute of silence. “I can already feel it happening. Things look weird, sound weird. Out of the blue I’ll start thinking about stuff that doesn’t make any sense. Sometimes the air around me feels … hard. I don’t even know what that means, but it’s scary. I’m definitely starting. The Flare’s taking my brain to hell.” Thomas couldn’t handle the look in her eyes; he let his gaze drop to the floor. “Don’t give up yet. We’ll make it to the safe haven, get the cure.” “False hope,” she said. “Guess that’s better than no hope at all.”

She squeezed his hand. This time, Thomas squeezed back.

And then, impossibly, they slept.