STATIC → newt , tmr [EDITING ; VERY SLOW UPDATES]

chapter v

Tiago sucked in a deep breath, ignoring the burning pain in his leg. He blinked slowly before nodding his head.

"No other way, right?" He met Newt's raised eyebrows and huffed out a chuckle. "Let's just get going. The faster we get there, the faster we can sit down."

It wasn't easy. Other than the main street they'd arrived at, the other streets in the city were narrow and crammed full of people, either selling things from homemade stalls or living off the side of the road. There were children and elderly people, large families, many dogs, crying babies―the city was full of life. After years of traversing through the city streets, Tiago still wasn't sure if it was a good or bad thing that there were so many people in one place.

Kim's old apartment was up two flights of stairs. Tiago knew it would be an obstacle, but he had put it off until they arrived at the building.

"Third floor," he said quickly, pointing to the busted down front doors of the building. "Number thirty-one." Minho and Newt shared a worried glance behind Tiago's shoulders, one that Tiago didn't miss. He rolled his eyes. "I can drag myself up the stairs, so don't worry about it."

He moved to unwrap his arms from their shoulders, but Newt didn't let him.

"You literally can't walk, mate," he said quickly, holding tightly to Tiago's wrist. "There's no way you'll make it up a flight of stairs without hurting yourself even more."

"I managed to walk across the entire Scorch with glass in my leg, I'm sure I can manage some stairs," Tiago retorted, feeling a sudden surge of stubbornness overtake him.

"If you can walk so well all of a sudden, why have we been carrying you the entire way?"

"I didn't ask you to," Tiago said loudly. He knew it was irrational, but he hated being babied. It reminded him too much of his mother.

The group was quiet for a few moments, not expecting Tiago to become suddenly frantic about people helping him. Eventually, Newt nodded and shrugged Tiago's arm off his shoulders. Tiago stumbled briefly, wobbling while he tried to balance his weight on his good leg.

"Well, if you're gonna be this stubborn about it," he said lightly. He walked through the doorway. Minho, Frypan, and Aris just watched the blond. Minho's gaze fell back to Tiago standing shakily beside him. Tiago met his eyes and huffed.

"Don't worry, just go. You're the ones on the run, not me." Minho raised his eyebrows, still not convinced. "Minho. Seriously. I don't need help, just go."

Minho finally relented and followed Frypan and Aris into the building. Tiago heaved out a sigh, glancing up at the third floor windows he could see. It would be hard, but Tiago had dealt with worse. He sucked in a deep breath, praying that he wouldn't injure himself further, and stepped into the building.

Halfway up the first flight of stairs, Tiago was beginning to think that maybe he did need help. He still hadn't figured out how to evenly distribute his weight between both legs so he wasn't in a lot of pain. He let out a hiss between his teeth as he shifted awkwardly while leaning against the wall―his leg cinched painfully, and when he looked down, Tiago saw that the bandage had dug into the wound. The only good thing about this situation was that the bandage wasn't soaked with blood. Now the gash just had to heal up.

Tiago collapsed to the ground on the second floor landing. He huffed out a few deep breaths, then grabbed his backpack from his shoulders and tugged it into his lap. His leg was screaming with pain, making Tiago flinch every time he moved it slightly, so he figured a break before climbing the next flight of stairs was necessary.