✓ | FLARES ➸ the maze runner ¹

020.

   She knew that Gally wanted her to change her mind. But, if he thought it would be that easy to convince Ken, he obviously didn't know her as well as he thought that he did.

    "I think he's got what it takes," she shrugged.

    "Yeah— he can run fast. So, what?" Gally scoffed, "All he's done is cause trouble!"

   Kennedy rolled her eyes, "You're being dramatic, Gal."

    "So you're telling me, you don't find anything about this shank remotely suspicious? You don't think it's weird that the minute he shows up, everything starts going wrong?" He crossed his arms, a deep creased between both eyebrows. "Ben being stung, Alby and Minho in the maze? He goes in there and kills a griever, and then the box comes up with a greenie? A girl?" Gally ignored Kennedy's pointed glare, "She knew him name, Ken! She's just as suspicious as he is," he snapped his fingers in a one, two, as if it would further whatever point he was trying to make. "And, she's the last one ever? I mean— what's that all about?" He stressed, to which Kennedy had a hard time arguing with. "How can you make him a runner when all he's done is ruin everything? Everything we've built? Our home!"

    "What do you want me to do, Gally?" Her words were sharper than they usually were, "You want me to start a trial, and find him guilty? Throw him into the maze?" She was exasperated, "All he'd do is survive, again!"

"I want you to realise he's bad news," he said. "You need to stop seeing the best in him, stop listening. You gotta realise the ones you should listen to are right in front of you. We're your family."

Eyes narrowing, Kennedy tightened the ponytail on the top of her head and crossed her arms. She didn't like what he was trying to imply. It made her stomach churn. When was it, that Gally had started doubting her? Did he think that she'd wanted the worst for the glade? It seemed that Gally thought so.

That hurt. He was using it against her, knowing how deeply she cared for the boys in their glade, and making it out that she didn't.

   He was wrong.

   He was so wrong, and it angered her.

Shuckface!

"He came up in that box," Kennedy argued, "He's one of us."

    "God—!" Gally snapped, "Do you hear yourself? He's got you brainwashed, Ken!" Pulling up a hand, he prodded at his temple to emphasise his point, squinted at her in anger and disbelief. He thought that she was insane to think that Thomas was one of the gladers, even after everything he had caused. Everything that had happened since his arrival had to be his fault; it had all happened because of Thomas. Gally didn't understand how Kennedy wasn't able to see it. "He's got in your head!"

"Thomas is just a kid!"

"He'll get us all killed!" He hissed, "And you'd be stupid, to trust him."

Kennedy glared, her eyes dark and daring.

She took a step towards him, one that he mirrored, but she felt no concern for his towering height. While Gally wouldn't hurt her, the look in his eyes was painful enough. It was then that Kennedy realised her friendship with Gally was broken, fractured. It wasn't repairable — their friendship was tainted forever, stained with the stubbornness of their opinions and bias', and Kennedy knew that she and Gally would never be the same. All that they had built, a bond that they had formed over years spent together, it was never going to be the same. Not after this. A Thomas-sized blockade had been wedged between them, and there was no going back. That blockade was there, and there it would stay, until one of them had decided to budge, or until Thomas himself relented. But she didn't see any chance in the above options happening, anytime soon. Her stubbornness was impeccably loud, and so was Gally's own.