World Gone Mad (TMR fic 3)

Chapter 15

I feel awful. I'm not in pain, really, just ill as my vision swims. Images are flashing across my mind, and opening my eyes is almost painful as I realize they aren't real. I'm in a small room. The surgery must be over.

I'm tired. So tired.

A word moves into my mind, and it catches my attention. Payton. My name had been Payton, once.

I gasp with the realization, a huge gulp of air that partially clears my senses.

"Are you okay?" Brenda is standing by my bed. Why is she here? The room is empty aside from her and the bed I'm strapped into.

Payton. Who was that girl, that girl from another life? And then the memories hit me. I had an older sister once. A mother. We lived in an old house that smelled of cinnamon, where our only light sources were candles and the sun.

Somehow we avoided looters and Cranks throughout my childhood. Until they came without warning, screaming Cranks slamming their fists against our door, our windows.

A cupboard. A cat. His name was Sherlock...

I force my mind to focus on WICKED instead of drowning in the memories of that day my sister and mother died. I need to remember WICKED.

My first introduction to their compound was the day they took me. They were almost gleeful when they figured out I was Immune. They threw Sherlock out of the vehicle when they were driving up to the gate, chasing him towards the forest.

Forest. WICKED is based halfway in a forest. I remember glimpses of it I had seen out of the window of the first room I stayed in. They left me there for a week, not letting me leave or doing anything with me. I thought I had died and gone to hell. Even when I was young I hated being left alone.

My mind starts to work faster, piecing together every trip down WICKED's halls I took throughout my stay there. The constant blood tests, the bizarrely structured classes, never getting to see anyone my age... being forced to respond to Ash, to forget my name... the first surgery that modified my mind... catching glimpses of Thomas and his friends through my window as they crept around at night... I hadn't been able to sneak away as easily. WICKED wanted to keep me separate, and they weren't dumb. I tried to get out a few times but was immediately hauled back to my room.

I had crossed paths with Newt twice in all of those years. The first was when I was being brought into WICKED for the first time and I saw him kill the Crank. They were using Sonya's existence to break him, to bend him to their will.

The second was the day he was sent into the Maze, when I watched him struggle as they dragged him past my classroom. He must have known he wouldn't see his sister again. I didn't know much about the Maze Trials. The leaders of WICKED never did trust me. But they needed me. They needed my mind. Because of how my brain functioned, they were able to massively ramp up Group A's Maze.

And, luckily enough for me now, I had gotten my hands on a map at one point. A new intern at WICKED had dropped it in a corner, and no one noticed me taking it.

That map became my lifeline. I didn't dare pull it out of my pocket and risk them realizing what I had, so I tore chunks off of it throughout the day, tiny pieces of paper. I stared at them until the information was burned into my mind, and then I stuck them in my mouth, chewing until the tough fibers were soft enough to bearably swallow.

It took me several days to eat the whole map, but by the time I had my mind was able to piece together the assorted chunks of map I had seen. After that, I was no longer lost. It was only a small comfort, but at least I knew where they were taking me whenever they led me to my next task.

I may have been a little girl named Payton once, but I've been Ash for far longer. And Ash, this machine WICKED created, never forgets a map.

I have an advantage.