Heaven Help Us // Thomas (The Death Cure)

XIII

Thomas and Ariella walked into the WICKED compound.

Ava Paige was standing in the middle of a hallway, windows covering one side. She was looking out at the city. Thomas held the gun up to her. Thomas's hand shook as he held the gun. "Is it true? Newt. Could we have saved him?"

"You two can save us all." Ava said softly.

Thomas dropped the gun and a sob escaped his lips. He didn't want to cry, so he did his best to hold it in. Ariella took his hand as Ava walked up to them. "It's okay."

"Just leave the others alone." Thomas said softly.

"I promise. I will..."

A gunshot resounded. Ava looked down at her chest and fell to the ground as her hand limply stained Thomas's shirt red.

Ariella dropped to her knees. "Mom! No!" She ran up to Janson, ready to attack him.

Janson grabbed the girl and jabbed her neck with something to make her sleep. He did the same thing to Thomas and said, "Oh, Thomas, Ariella, you should have run."

Thomas and Ariella woke up to see Teresa extracting blood from them.

"Do you know what this place is, Thomas? What about you, Ariella?" The teens didn't answer him. "It's a lifeboat. And the whole world might be sinking, but it doesn't mean that we have to go down with it. How much longer?"

Thomas realized he was strapped into the chair, as was Ariella. He tried to yank the restraints even though he knew it'd prove useless.

"It's almost done." Teresa replied.

"Why don't you just kill us?" Thomas asked.

"Kill you? Kill her? No, we don't wanna do that. We're gonna take special care of you two. We'll keep you alive. Just." Thomas lunged at Janson. "And in return, you will give life to the rest of us. The ones we choose to save, anyway. Of course, there's not gonna be enough for everyone. Even with two of you. Hard choices are gonna have to be made. In time, the Flare virus will burn itself out. The only question is, who will be the ones left standing?" He took the vial from Teresa's hand. "And thanks to you two, to this, we finally get to choose. A future of our own making." He readied to inject himself with the blood. "To your health."

Janson leaned closer to Ariella and she spit in his face. "Never! Never!"

He slapped her and Thomas roared, "Don't touch her!"

Teresa hit Janson's head with a hard object and he fell to the ground unconscious.

"Okay, let's get out of here." Teresa said, undoing Thomas's restraints.

"Come on." Thomas said.

Janson stood up and grabbed Teresa's hair. "No!"

She did her best to dodge him, the vial in her hand. Thomas got out of the restraints and glanced at Ariella. "I'll figure this out. Go help her. Give him some payback."

Thomas nodded and lunged at Janson, forcing him through a glass window. Janson punched Thomas and twisted his shirt around the choke the boy.

Thomas slammed Janson against a wall and stood up.

Teresa woke up and ran over to Ariella's bedside to free her from the restraints.

"Come on." Janson said.

Thomas swung a punch at the infected man. Janson got tired of it and pulled out a gun. "Okay. That's enough."

Teresa and Ariella appeared and the latter ran at Janson, head first. Normally, Thomas would've laughed, but he was too worried about his girlfriend's current stupidity. After all, their current enemy had a gun.

A blast from outside racked their floor and they fell to the ground.

Thomas helped Ariella up, and the three kids ran off in the opposite direction. Thomas glanced back and saw a gun pointed at his girlfriend. "Ariella!" He pushed her out of the way.