Subject of the Flame | Maze Runner [2]

TWELVE

[ ELECTRA ]

❧

Electra assumed, with the speed of everything around her since she'd woken up in this weird new building, that WICKED would be showing up any second and either chastising them, giving them new tests, or sending them to their deaths. But, two days later Electra laid down on her bed, clutching her stomach from hunger pains.

Water wasn't a problem, since they had fully functional bathrooms, but none of the Gladers had eaten in two days. Electra felt frail, and every time she moved her body would tremble uncontrollably.

For the first day, her mind was consumed with overlapping thoughts. She could never turn it off. However, by the end of the second day, Electra couldn't even focus on a single thought for five seconds. Her mind didn't seem to belong to her anymore, and she simply just observed as it slowly spun from one thought to another. She'd never felt this weak before, and she spent most of her time asleep to avoid the misery.

At the end of the second day, Electra slipped into unconsciousness. Usually, her sleeping was quick and merely felt like a blink. But this time, she had a dream, similar to her first one.

She was older in this new dream. She could somehow tell. She walked down a desolate long hallway, the scent of cleaning chemicals filling her nostrils. Electra passed by numerous doors and tried to think of the rooms that could be behind them. None of the rooms had windows, and all the doors were closed, so she could only stare at the white doors as she was led down the hall.

She felt a hand on her back. A man was pushing her forward. On her side was the boy from her first dream. He was older now too. Maybe around ten. Electra assumed she must've been around the same age.

The man leading them down the hall ushered them toward a thick metal door. He gently pushed the kids into the room before closing the door. Electra looked around, unable to recognize anything around her. The boy, however, treated the room as if he'd been there thousands of times before. He lazily made his way over to a couch at the back of the room and flopped onto it, grabbing a book from the table and opening it.

Electra was going to speak to him, but a knock at the door shifted her attention. She spun just as two trays of food were pushed through a small gap in the door. The gap closed shut before she could do anything, and the trays sat precariously on a small surface connected to the door.

The boy got up and grabbed his tray, looking down at the food before scrunching his nose in disgust. "Even by apocalypse standards, the food here is terrible."

Electra felt herself laughing, but she wasn't in control of her body. She was merely an inside observer. She grabbed her tray and sat down at a table near a small kitchenette. Well, just cabinets and a sink. Nothing else a normal kitchen would have. Electra tried to remember just how she would know what a normal kitchen would have.

"Why do they even lock us in here every night?" The boy asked, picking through his pasta with a fork.

Electra shrugged. "Guess they don't want us snooping around and breaking all the expensive lab stuff."

She stole a look up at the boy sitting across from her, and this time she could see his face. His eyes were blue, and his features were soft. His light brown hair fell in waves down to his chin, and he cast her a sauce-filled smile. She couldn't recognize him, but Electra felt herself smiling back at him.