"PEPPER, WE NEED YOU AT THE FRONT."
"Can't Alby do it? I'm busy," Eden shot back absentmindedly, half paying any sort of attention as she looked through the eyepiece of her microscope.
"Ben has been stung. He attacked Thomas."
Her head immediately snapped up, concern pouring from her squinting eyes. She practically jumped up and ran across the small room, routing through the cupboard in the corner of the room. She looked through it for a split second and grabbed whatever it was she needed before exiting the lab out of the door that Newt held open for her. She ran as fast as her legs could carry her toward the crowd of people, who immediately parted at her approach.
Meters away, she quickly ordered, "Someone lift his shirt." So by the time she was in view of Ben, the area around his heart was already visible. She frowned as she crouched down next to him, being sure to keep her distance, knowing the danger currently living inside of him. She gently traced the veins with her fingers, contemplating whether it was worth attempting to cure him or it wasn't worth wasting something another Glader could use. She could logistically tell that it was too late, by the way, the darkness was increasingly growing even now. But she wanted to give him some sort of chance despite that, to be hopeful.
"Hold tight," she broke the ever-so-tense silence, talking to the multiple people that held his limbs down. They all did so, holding him as still as possible. She took the cap off the needle and injected the bluish-green liquid into his arm. "Tie him down in the med hut, away from everyone," she half ordered, talking to Alby directly instead of all the others.
She stood, spinning the syringe between her fingers, before she walked back out of the crowd which once again parted for her to be able to leave easily. Newt followed quickly after her, walking next to her in silence while they were close enough for the others to hear. "Will it work?" he asked in a whisper, glancing behind him to make sure that no one had heard.
She shrugged, "Not sure. He seems too far gone but... It's worth a try, right?"
"Of course it is," he replied, nodding and smiling somewhat reassuringly. It did make her feel slightly better, maybe a minuscule amount.
She turned to head in the direction of the lab, thinking that she could find something within there to calm her thoughts for a while. Or until sundown. "Keep me updated?" she asked somewhat softly, not daring to glance back toward the group of Gladers as Ben was most likely being taken to the med hut.
Newt nodded and within seconds, she disappeared into the lab once more. He simply knew not to disturb her, that she would want to just stew within her own thoughts. Yet something within him wanted to go andstay with her until sundown.
☪
FOUR OR FIVE HOURS LATER, she didn't quite know how long it was, sundown approached and therefore the maze doors closing became closer. She sighed deeply and pulled herself from her desk, knowing that she had put off going into the Medhut for far too long. She walked over, noticing the small crowd of people that had gathered outside the room to hear the news about their fellow Glader.
Eden walked through the door to the Medhut, lifting the curtain that covered the bed that Ben was in. She frowned, noticing how he looked awful and not better in the slightest. "Anything?" she whispered to Alby, surveying Ben from where she stood instead.
"Nothing at all," Alby whispered back, watching as the colour drained from her face completely.
She walked up to Ben, watching as his face contorted into some form of a smile that was supposed to paint the picture of him being okay and not overtaken by the Griever venom. "Ben," she whispered, smiling reassuringly so whatever part of his brain was left wasn't completely panicked.
She looked into his eyes, immediately seeing the darkness that clouded the edges of his eyes. Not to mention the sweat that slicked his forehead. His anger flared up at the look in her eyes and he half ounces up, trying to attack her. She jumped back, already suspecting such a thing to occur and found her frown deepening even more. Newt had placed an arm on her shoulder as she jumped back, ready to pull her out of the way if it was necessary. She then, once he had calmed once more, took some of his blood and found a sinking feeling within her stomach. The blood was majorly thick and black. She tried to hide it from the others, immediately covering the tube with her sleeve.
"He's too far gone," she muttered to herself, trying to come to terms with such a face. The blackness in the corners of his mouth was her last straw, he had to be banished. She turned and walked away from the bed, catching Alby's shoulder just as she was about to step out of the room. "Put him in the pit. Banishment at sundown," she whispered, unable to even look back at him. Ben quickly noticed the look in both Newt and Alby's eyes and tugged against the restraints.
"No! Eden no! Please!" he yelled in utter desperation, making her flinch as she walked away and out of the med hut as it seemed that the wall had started to close in on her.
"Pepper!" Newt yelled after her, dramatically exiting the med hut. He looked around him, noticing all the people crowded around and quickly ordered, "All of you leave, now." He paused as they all walked away then ran after her, yelling once more, "Pepper!"
She gave no response and just continued her quick walk, disappearing into the lab with a slam of her door.
She placed the blood sample in her cooler and had her head resting on the desk by the time Newt walked in, gently closing the door behind him instead of slamming it as she had.
"I failed... again," she broke the silence, voice muffled by the desk and her arms.
"Pepper..."
She looked up, finding him standing at her side instead of in front of the desk as she had thought so before. "People expect me to cure people Newt, I can't even do that," she replied, completely ingnoring his tone, as her voice came out in such a pained whisper that it hurt something within him.
"It's not your fault the lab caught on fire and burnt all your notes and things," he quickly reminded her, watching a slight glimpse of something behind her eyes.
She sighed, "It's my fault I couldn't remember it though. Stupid awful memory."
His eyes softened, looking directly into hers so the message went further into her brain, "No one expected you to Pepper."
She sighed deeply, wiping the edge of her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt. "Another Glader... that's what, six now?"
"It would have been nine if you hadn't cured the others, they're fine. Aren't they?"
"Seems so," she shrugged, digging through the piles and piles of papers and folders on her desk as they talked. "Still, I can't believe I let such a thing burn. I should have kept a proper copy. And I should have kept the chemical safer."
"You can't let yourself spiral like this," he whispered, voice-only full of pure concern, as he placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder and squeezed it slightly.
"It's far too late for that," she laughed with some sort of amusement, he didn't quite know what it truly was. She then proceeded to stand, striding across the room with a single messy file in hand- Ben's file. She threw it into the bin, paper fluttering into the black can that would later be used for kindling in the kitchen.
He took her by the shoulders before she could return to the desk and fall into her teary pit of despair once more. She looked his face up and down, confusion contorting her features, until he pulled her into a hug. A soul-melting hug with his hand behind her head, her face resting on his shoulder as he held her close.
"It's not your fault, Pepper," he reassured in a whisper, sending waves of chills through her spinning mind.
She sighed deeply, resting her head on his shoulder as she muttered, "Wish I could believe you."
YOU ARE READING
Little lies - NEWT
Fanfiction❝ I just wish you could see the way that I feel about you.❞ ❝ Show me.❞ - EDEN had spent the whole of her life, that she remembered, trying to find something within the chemicals that she was given every month. She had not found anything until a cer...
