IT STARTED WITH A MAZE - Newt x Reader (F)

- A MAN BUILT ON LIES -

Empty.

The room is abandoned.

Every bed is unmade, covers tossed aside. No Newt. No Minho. No Thomas. No Frypan. No Winston. No Jack. They're gone.

Gone.

My father stares, stunned. And I smile. "They escaped," I whisper. The sirens start almost instantly. Red lights begin to flash in the corners of the hall. The sterile, humming calm of the facility is broken by a shrill mechanical voice.

"Security breach. Sector D. All personnel initiate lockdown protocol. Repeat - lockdown protocol is in effect."

Guards rush past us, barking into radios. I can hear doors slamming shut across the compound. Chaos unfolds around us in the blink of an eye. My father whirls on the guards. "Take her to Medical!"

"What about the others?" One of them shouts over the alarms.

"They'll join her soon enough," he says, voice like a knife. And then he disappears down the corridor, already hunting them.

Already planning his next move.

The guards seize me without hesitation.

Rough hands clamp around my arms, dragging me backward as I twist and fight, heels scraping against the smooth white floor. My voice rises in protest, but no one listens - only the cold slam of boots and the heavy buzz of security locks answer me. I barely glimpse the corridor before I'm shoved through a set of doors and into a sterile room humming with fluorescent lights.

They throw me onto the medical bed.

Thick leather restraints lash across my wrists and ankles, cinched down until I can feel my pulse throbbing against the tight buckles. The overhead light flickers once, harsh and clinical. The silence presses in, sharp as glass. A slow, mechanical whir echoes through the corners of the room - the sound of a machine waiting for orders.

I breathe in.

Out.

But there's no calming down. I'm alone. The kind of alone that curls cold fingers around your throat.

Time passes again - how much, I don't know. Minutes? Hours? The silence stretches until it feels unbearable.

Then the door hisses open. My father steps inside, calm, composed, too put together for a man who just locked his own daughter to a table. "You're alone," I spit the words at him, defiant. Then I realise what that could mean, and my face shatters.

He notices the expression. "They're not dead." The air catches in my throat. "They're just... trying to escape," he says. "And I need leverage." His eyes cut through me. Cold. Clinical. Calculating. The father I once knew is gone. This is Janson now. Entirely Janson. "Untie her," he tells the guards.

"What are you doing?" I snap as the restraints fall away from my limbs.

"What do you think?" He replies coolly, brushing nonexistent dust off his jacket. "You're going to help me get them back in line. Or I'll kill them."

"No," I breathe, stepping back, fingers twitching like I might claw my way through the walls. "They're no use to you dead. That's what this is all about, right? Data. Control. They matter."

His jaw tightens. "Are you willing to take that risk?" The silence that stretches between us says everything. I want to scream at him, fight him, tackle him to the ground. But I don't move. I don't speak. Because he knows. He knows I'm not willing to put their lives on the line. The nod he gives to the guards is slow, self-satisfied. "Let's go."