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

- A FINAL DESPERATE SPRINT -

The room fills with the hum of fluorescent lights and the beat of my heart pounding in my ears.

Teresa doesn't speak for a long moment. But her hands move again, this time with more certainty, as she finishes stabilizing the serum. Her shoulders are tense, but I see it - that flicker of belief. Of hope.

The door handle jerks with a loud clack. A voice calls from the other side, muffled but sharp, female. "Teresa? Are you still in there? You shouldn't still be working. We need to leave - now."

Teresa stiffens. Her hands freeze over the syringe. "It's Dr. Paige," she murmurs. Another voice follows, quieter, warped by the heavy door. Male, deeper, more agitated. The kind of voice you don't want knowing your name. "That's probably Janson," she adds grimly, her face pale under the lab lights.

The banging intensifies. "Teresa?" Dr. Paige's voice comes again, harder now. "What are you doing?"

I glance to the syringe - thick with crimson and a thin trace of something glowing faintly blue. It's finished. Teresa pulls it back, caps it. "Where are the others now?" She asks suddenly, voice clipped with urgency.

"Near the south side. Down the main road, on our way to the exit tunnels," I answer, pulse racing now. "But give it to me- please. I'll get it to Newt. I can-"

"No," she says, already moving. "If Janson finds you in here, neither of us will make it out. But if you leave now- if you get back to the others, I'll get the vial to you."

My breath hitches. I feel the confusion screw up my features. "What are you talking about? Why not just hand it to me now?" I demand, becoming irritated.

Teresa hesitates, jaw clenched, eyes darting to the door as another bang rattles it in its frame. "Because I need more blood," she blurts. "Your sample- this one dose- isn't enough. I can't recreate it without another draw, and if I give this to you now, you'll save Newt and disappear," she states. "I'll lose everything. The world will lose the only real cure we've ever had."

"Teresa-" I step forward, voice pleading. "Please, trust me. Once I save Newt, I'll come back. I'll donate every drop I can. I'll do it. I swear to you-"

Her face contorts, torn between logic and hope. "I know you came back in here because you trust me," she says slowly. "But I can't trust your word." The door thuds again. Louder this time. The male voice yells her name - Janson, definitely. Teresa turns fully to face me now. "Because if I was safe with the boy I loved..." Her voice falters, but her eyes don't. "There's no way in hell I'd leave him again." It hits me like a damn gut punch. My throat tightens. Teresa presses the syringe against her chest protectively. I stare at her. She stares back.

And I feel fucked.

The lab door bursts open with a violence that makes my entire body flinch. Splinters fly. The metal edge slams into the wall behind it, and standing there - flushed with fury, breathing heavy from exertion - is Janson.

He fills the doorway like a shadow stretching too long. Two security agents flank him, but he holds up a hand, keeping them back for now.

Teresa goes still, her face settling into that familiar mask of calm calculation. She carefully slips the syringe behind her lab coat, guarding it like a secret weapon.

Janson's eyes snap straight to me - sharp, piercing, unreadable. The moment his gaze locks on, the air shifts, thickening with tension. "Well, well," he says, voice low but cutting like a blade. "Look who decided to show up again." Teresa doesn't flinch, but there's a flicker of unease in her eyes. Janson's stare doesn't waver. He takes slow, deliberate steps closer, each echo on the sterile floor ringing loud. "You're clearly still as stubborn as ever," he says, voice almost amused. "But I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. You've gained that quality, and I can only assume it came from your mother."

My heart stutters at that - not just because of his words, but because I know exactly where this is going. "Don't talk about her," I seethe.

He turns slightly, looking at Teresa briefly, then back to me. "Do you remember what happened that night? When Chuck and you were just kids?" The room feels colder. I swallow hard. I don't remember, and I know that this is his chance to get inside my head. "That night," Janson continues, voice low and rough, "when your mother left us - she tried taking you both away, said you'd be safer."

"We would have been," I retort, clenching my fists, trying to hold the rage back. "It would have been better than you. You who controls and destroys everything around yourself!"

He snaps, the first crack in his calm facade. "You think it was easy? Watching you and Chuck ripped away because I couldn't save your mother from herself?! From her dream of rebellion?!" He yells. Janson steps closer and I mirror one back. "I couldn't have you mixed up in it." His voice breaks slightly, raw beneath the cruelty. "I believed then- if I kept you close, kept you inside the walls, I could protect you from all of it. From the Maze, the Scorch, the Cure. I thought I was saving you," he says. Then a new emotion crosses over his features. one I haven't seen before. "But all I did was trap you. And every day you suffered, every trial you faced, I felt it - guilt gnawing at my soul."

I stare, stunned by the confession buried beneath his rage and control. For a moment, I see the man he perhaps once was - the father who loved us, twisted and broken as that love may be.

But that moment fades.

"Its too late guilt trip me," I make very clear. His guard rises once more and I see the terrible man I recognise.

"So you came back to play the hero," he snarls again, voice rising. "Pretending like you can fix what I've built. But you don't understand sacrifice. You never have."

I reach for my pistol, heart pounding. "I'm not here for you," I spit, finger tightening on the trigger. "I'm here to stop you."

He laughs then, cold and hollow. He sees my true reasoning - knew it from our first reunion in the Scorch. "You think your love can fix this? You don't know what it means to lose everything. To have your whole world fall apart," he bites. The tension spikes as more alarms blare down the hall, the warning echoing like thunder.

Teresa steps forward, her voice sharp and urgent. "Janson, enough. This isn't the time," she says. His eyes flick to her, suspicion burning. There's a question of loyalty written all over his stare. Teresa holds his gaze steadily. "I'm trying to save everyone I can," she makes clear.

He scoffs, bitter. "I think you need to be reminded on our mission here," he states ominously.

Teresa's eyes flick to me, then toward a shadowed side door. Her hand moves subtly, signaling escape.

A quick, sharp nod from her.

I take a breath, heart hammering in my chest. With one last furious glare at Janson - a man evidently broken by love and fear - I aim for his head-

But Teresa smacks my wrist as I fire the pistol. It misses any real target but causes the guards and the cursed man duck. I don't bother yelling at Teresa - I don't know why she just saved him. I simply take the time I'm given to run, open the door and dart into the corridor beyond.

Alarms scream behind me, footsteps pounding. But I don't slow down. Not now.

I run with everything I have - lungs burning, hope blazing - toward my friends, toward the fire, toward the fragile chance Teresa promised.

Because she will come.

She has to.

~