The Final Escape: Newt

twenty-three

Tide and Minho crawled farther into the vents, stopping when they decided they were far enough from the other boys. She slowly rocked Isaac, leaning into Minho's side as her son slowly fell back asleep.

"Tide I need to get that tracker out of your arm." Minho said quietly, and she shook her head, looking up at him seriously.

"Minho take Isaac and find the rest of the boys." She said sternly but Minho shook his head frantically.

"No. Tide I'm not leaving you here." He started and Tide handed her son to him.

She took a deep breath before continuing, "You know as well as I do that we can't get the tracker out of my arm. Take Isaac and find the rest of the boys." Her eyes filled with tears and Minho slowly nodded, using his free hand to pull Tide into a hug. 

"I'll be back for you. I promise." He mumbled into her hair and she nodded, lifting her head from his chest and pressed a kiss to his cheek. Minho pressed something into her hand, a knife, small enough to fit into her pocket, and she closed her fingers around it.  

"Take care of them, okay?" She asked and Minho nodded before crawling back in the direction that the boys went, leaving Tide to crawl the other way in hopes of giving the boys more time to escape. 

-

She was starting to get bored of crawling through the vents, after having thought about how Newt would react to her absence for the past hour or so. That was, until she felt a breeze coming from the direction she was headed in. There was some sand in the vent, presumably from outside. She decided to follow the trail, which lead her to a vent, barely large enough for her to fit through which lead to the outside. 

Though the desert was dark, she could make out the silhouettes of the boys running through the sand, getting smaller and smaller as each second passed by. A million thoughts raced through her mind in that second. She reached into her back pocket and pulled out the knife Minho had handed her before he left. She felt around her arm for the small bump and dragged the knife across the skin, pulling the small tracker out and chucking it down the vent.

The cut hurt, but with the adrenaline pumping through her veins she didn't mind it as much. She tore off a small piece of her shirt, wrapping it around her forearm where the cut was and pulled the vent off the wall just before diving out.

She fell for a few seconds before landing on her side with an 'oomf'. She looked up to find that she had only fallen from about 15 feet and nthe only thing that hurt was her arm. She prayed it would go away quickly but it only seemed to be getting worse. She whimpered in pain but never the less, got to her feet and started running in the direction that she saw the boys running in. 

Sand bit at her skin as she tried to find them. She decided looking for footsteps was useless since the sand was being whipped around her in all directions anyways. Her booted leg was making it harder for her to run but she carried on, not yet giving up knowing that she was this close to finding her friends again.

"Newt!" She called but received no response, "Minho!" She yelled again only to choke on some sand and collapsed on the ground, cradling her injured arm close to her chest as she curled into a ball praying the boys might have heard her.

Tide felt sleep begin to take over her as she tried to figure out a way to find the boys but came up with nothing and instead, felt her eyes closing and her body relaxing as the pain in her body started to increase as she finally let herself realize how badly she injured herself. Tears started streaming down her face as she realized that she might never see Newt again, or Isaac or Thomas or Minho. She drifted off with that thought, praying she would be found.

-

Tide woke up the next morning in Thomas's arms as he carried his baby sister into the building the boys had found sanctuary in for the night. He had been out, checking the area out when he noticed her figure, curled up not to far away from the building they had stayed in. 

"Tommy?" She murmured hoarsely, her voice hurt as she had been calling for the boys so much the night before and her entire body ached.

"Yea, I'm right here Tide. Don't worry. Just go back to sleep. You need to rest." He cooed, as he approached the group where everyone was fast asleep, Newt, having had the hardest time falling asleep seemed to be restless as he stirred, tossing back and forth on the floor in his sleep.

Thomas gently laid her down on the floor, walking over and grabbing the bag which Minho had filled with Isaac's necessities as well as first aid materials. He knelt down next to his sister and gently tore off the cloth she had wrapped around her forearm to stop the bleeding from where she cut the tracker out. He then wrapped her arm up with some proper medical material, silently thanking his sister for not cutting too deep into her arm which saved him from having to give her stitches. 

While he worked on getting her sprained arm into a sling, some of the other boys started waking up, happily surprised to find that Tide had made it back to the group. Newt, who woke up later than everyone else mostly because he had been up the latest searching for her with Thomas, immediately knelt down next to his girlfriend, groggily trying to figure out what had happened to her. 

He knelt on the opposite side of Thomas, piecing together exactly what had happened to Tide. "Where did you find her?" Newt asked as he held Tide's hand in his own in an attempt to calm himself down and assure him this was real and he wasn't just dreaming. 

Thomas looked up at his friend, "She was outside, I think she must've tried following us and fainted in the sand or something. She wasn't looking too good when I found her." He said softly before adding, "But the only really bad injuries seem to be on her left arm. Other than that my guess is she's just gonna be sore." 

Newt nodded and brushed a piece of Tide's wavy brown hair from her face, feeling his lips curl into a smile when she opened her eyes. 

"Hey... I missed you, love." Newt whispered, using his thumb to rub circles on her temple as she woke up. 

Tide sighed, looking from Newt then over to Thomas and finally Minho, who was currently watching Isaac, and the other boys who stood at her feet, all watching her wearily. She turned her attention back to Newt and whispered, "I missed you too." 

He smiled and pressed a kiss to her forehead, "Don't ever do that to me again, okay?" 

Tide nodded, "I won't." She mumbled, clearly sleepy from having such a rough night in the desert.

"Good that." Was the last thing Tide heard before she drifted off into sleep again.