"I still think it's a bad idea." Clara said firmly.
She and the leader had been arguing for the past hour, still failing to agree on the topic of running the Maze.
"How else are we supposed to get out of this place?" Nick retaliated, throwing his hands up tiredly.
Clara had done a one-eighty, becoming fervently against Runners going out in the Maze now that they knew there were Grievers trying to kill them. She argued that it was perfectly logical to stop running the Maze. They had no way to fight the creatures so they'd be risking their lives going out there, and they knew they never came into the Glade; so they could be relatively safe inside.
"Maybe we're never going to get out, Nick!" Her voice had raised to a yell, causing Nick to come to a stand still, not saying a word in response.
She was losing hope.
Another Greenie had arrived, and another Runner had been caught in the Maze overnight. Clara may have been against running the Maze but ultimately Nick was the leader, and when the Runners wanted to go out there she couldn't stop them.
However, when one of the Runners got stuck in the Maze - and his clothes were found the next day by Minho - Clara knew it was her opportunity to try and persuade Nick to agree with her on the Maze. And she really did believe that the Maze was a lost cause.
The girl had stopped thinking about escaping, about living in the real world, about those she loved around her. Instead, she was just thinking about surviving, scraping by. And although Nick had noticed this, he wasn't sure how to change her perspective on things.
"We have to try, Clara." Placing his hands on her shoulders, he forced her to look at him. "If we don't have a sense of hope, this place is gonna go to klunk."
His word choice made a laugh pass her lips, and then she shook her head in an attempt to hide her smirk. Nick chuckled too, squeezing her shoulders then dropping his hands.
"Please, we need to try."
She still looked apprehensive about it all. Nick didn't need her approval to allow the Runners to go in the Maze, but he wanted it. Her opinion mattered to him, and he'd feel guilty unless their views were the same.
"The Runners are the fastest and the strongest in the Glade. They have the sharpest minds, and the most focus. They can get us out of here, and they can do it whilst keeping all of us alive."
"Okay." She blurted out, almost impatiently. Nick wasn't going to stop bugging her about it, so she had to agree. "They can keep trying. But we better shucking get out of here soon."
It was only two weeks later that Clara found herself gathered at the Maze's entrance, awaiting the arrival of a Runner who hadn't appeared in the Glade the day before. The doors opened, revealing no one, and the girl narrowly stopped herself from shooting Nick a knowing glance.
That day, the boy's clothes were found out in the Maze. And from then on, it was basically confirmed that being stuck in the Maze overnight was a death sentence.
Clara found her attention turned elsewhere.
Newt had stopped appearing at dinner with everyone else. Minho would take a plate of food up to the boy's room after he had finished eating himself, and eventually, the same began to happen with breakfast too.
The only time that the girl would see Newt was when he left to the Maze, when he went to the Map room, and when he went up to his room in the evening. And every time she saw him, he wore a frown. He looked like an empty shell of himself.
"I'm worried about Newt."
She brought up the topic to Nick and Minho one night at dinner, both looking up from their meals to stare at her. The leader looked confused, glancing to Minho who seemed to share the same concern as the girl.
"Why? What's up with Newt?"
Clara couldn't believe Nick hadn't noticed. To be fair, he had been quite preoccupied with Runner business lately, and the fast stream of tragedies recently hitting the Glade.
"He doesn't eat with any of us anymore. He's distancing himself."
Minho nodded to confirm, his fork trailing the food on his plate as he added that, "I keep trying to talk to him. He just fakes a smile or tells me he's too tired to talk."
Nick looked thoughtfully at Minho's glum expression before turning back to his food. He seemed to be mulling over their words carefully.
"So what should we do?"
"Make sure he can't cut us off." Minho decided stubbornly.
Nick nodded in agreement. The pair watched as Minho made his way away from the table, took up the usual plate waiting for Newt on the kitchen counter, and disappeared up the stairs of the Homestead.
They shared a glance, and as Clara dragged her food around her plate, Nick realised that she was deeply concerned about Newt. Reaching out, he let his hand rest over hers, and gave her a soft smile.
"I'm sure he'll be fine, okay?"
There was no sense of triumph when Clara was proved right to be worried. All the girl felt was devastation when Alby staggered into the Glade hours early, with a barely conscious Newt in his arms.
Alby was struggling, tears spilling down his face as he tried his best to not jolt Newt. The blonde was letting out small yelps of distress as the other made his way further into the Glade, yelling out to try and capture anyone's attention.
Clara was first to reach them both, trying desperately to stop Alby's tears as she looked to Newt. His face was relatively fine, only a little dirty and dusty, like his chest and arms; except from a few scratches. And then she caught sight of what was causing him pain.
His leg.
Bent at an odd angle, it was bruised black and blue already, swelling at the knee. Blood was smeared along the entirety of it, still spilling out from a wound Clara hadn't yet identified the place of.
Clint was next on the scene, alongside a Gardener Clara didn't recognise that was filling in for Jeff as he was sick. They carefully took Newt from Alby's arms, carrying the injured boy on a stretcher to the room set up for more serious injuries.
They hadn't used that room yet. Clara was hoping that they'd never have to.
The girl usually would've raced off to the room after Clint, but something unknown was keeping her grounded in her place, to talk to Alby. The boy in question was furiously wiping away his tears, as if he was ashamed to be seen so upset.
"Was he Stung?" Clara asked firmly, although her voice wobbled furiously at the possibility of yet another friend dying. Especially that friend being Newt.
Alby shook his head, tears still brimming at his eyes when he croaked out, "I think he jumped off one of the walls."
And Clara decided that was worse.
She managed to swallow down the sob rising in her throat as she told Alby to go get some rest, and not to worry about his Map for the day. There's no way he'd be able to focus, not with Newt's state.
The girl made her way to where Newt had been taken, her body trembling in worry for the boy, and her head swirling in a confused upset for Alby's suggestion. She hesitated before entering the room, questioning if she really wanted to see her friend in that state. And then she realised that she needed to help him.
The Gardener filling in for Jeff was nowhere to be seen - he'd be completely out of his depth there - so Clint was alone in the room. Despite the look of it all, the Med-jack seemed relatively calm. Newt was unconscious, a bottle of pills beside him on the bedside table led Clara to realise that was the reason why, and surprisingly it wasn't from the amount of blood that had seeped through the towels around his leg.
"How is he?" She asked Clint, making him jump.
He paused for a moment, shaking his head, before moving to Newt's side to bandage up his leg. He said nothing, instead just worked away in aiding the boy's injuries, and Clara moved to his side to silently indicate she could do the same.
She helped Clint apply a splint to Newt's leg.
Without the boy telling her anything, she knew something was badly wrong with it. She wouldn't be surprised if he later told her that it was broken in several different places. The only thing she was grateful for was that Newt's leg was the only badly injured thing on his body.
Clint finished wrapping Newt's lower leg in bandages, not too tightly to interrupt the blood flow, as Clara rummaged through the Med-jack supplies to look for a splint and scissors. They pressed the splint to the side of Newt's leg, cut some bandages to a shorter length, and secured the splint by tying it below the ankle and just above the knee.
"When Newt wakes up, we'll have to ask him about the sensation in his leg; make sure he doesn't have any nerve problems. And one of us will have to watch him to make sure his leg doesn't turn white; make sure the splint isn't too tight."
"I can watch him." She replied, quietly.
Clint nodded in agreement, knowing that it was best she did, because she'd be too sick with worry if she was away from him. When she had stood back from Newt, it had finally sunk in. He had tried to hurt himself. And he really, really did.
But he didn't just hurt himself.
He hurt everyone around him. Clara was sure that he wouldn't have done it if he was aware of how important he was to everyone. He was the glue. He kept everyone together.
"His leg's never gonna be the same again. It's broken in three places." Clint spoke bluntly, and the girl noticed there was a glint of frustrated tears in his eyes. "There's only so much we can do, in this place, with no proper doctors or hospitals. He'll always have a limp."
"At least he's alive." Clara pressed, refusing to let herself cry, and momentarily blocking the blonde boy from her sight. "If Alby hadn't found him I- I don't know if he would've made it."
Up until very recently, Newt would've been running with Minho. They changed it only a few days ago. Made it that the Runners would no longer have running partners, in order to cover more of the Maze, and give them all a day off every so often if they rotated who ran.
Minho. He's going to be devastated.
Quickly, the girl realised that the Runners would be appearing back from the Maze. Minho, after Mapping, would be heading to find Newt somewhere in the Glade. But he wouldn't find him anywhere.
She told Clint to watch Newt for a moment, before quickly moving from the room in search of the Keeper of the Runners. As if on cue, she spotted him at the Maze entrance, talking with Nick.
Both of them looked tired from running, and so, so oblivious. Clara didn't want to have to break the news to them. But she had to.
She was greeted with two bright smiles as she walked over, both of which evaporated when the saw the troubled expression on her face. She quietly told them they wouldn't have to do their maps for the day - it was fair enough that they would be thrown out of the window in the circumstances - still holding off on the bad news.
"What's going on, Clara?"
Nick knew her far too well. He could see her fidgeting hands, and her trembling figure. He fixed her with a determined glare and the question, and Clara had to muster up all the strength inside of her to reply,
"Newt's hurt."
Simply saying the two words was stupid, as Minho's eyes immediately widened and he broke away from her to try and find the boy already. Clara and Nick were left to chase after him, the girl pulling on his arm and leaving her hand there to keep him in place.
"Please, let me explain first. I promise you, he's going to be okay."
Minho's chest was heaving with fearful breaths, and he looked more panicked than Clara had ever seen him before. And then he stopped still, nodding at the girl, knowing it would be quicker to let her talk.
"Alby came into the Glade a few hours ago, carrying Newt. He was all dirtied up, and his leg was in a really bad way."
Her voice softened to that of a whisper and she realised then that there was no way she could explain why Newt was hurt without crying. Minho still watched her expectantly, Nick had practically faded into the background, and she focused all of her attention on the Keeper of the Runners.
"Alby says he thinks Newt jumped. From one of the walls."
She could feel hot tears on her cheeks then, blurring her vision from a terrified Minho who felt like his heart had been ripped out of his chest. He shifted in his place, causing Clara's hand to slip from his arm, but then he took it in his hand instead.
"You said he's okay, right? Can I see him?"
"You can see him when he's awake Minho, I just- is it okay if I talk to him first?"
She knew it was a lot to ask of the boy, but the way she looked at him told him that he could have all the time he wanted with the boy after she spoke to him. He hesitated, his hand involuntarily squeezing hers as he finally nodded.
"Yeah, of course."
She paused there, hand in Minho's, and Nick finally came back into view. It looked like he had a hundred more questions about it all, but stayed silent. Clint came into their view then, sidling over to the group with a guarded expression.
"We need to keep this a secret." He said then, met by three curious glances. "For Newt. If I know anything, it's that he wouldn't want anyone else to find out about why he's hurt."
Clara turned back to Newt's room, not without squeezing Minho's hand one last time, leaving Clint to explain the damage of his leg to the two Runners. She had also advised them to inform Alby of keeping the reasoning of the injury quiet, although she was sure he would do so anyway.
She arrived in the room to find the boy still sleeping soundly, his right hand thrown up on his pillow beside his head, and the other hanging off the side. Settling in the chair beside him, she reached for a book the Creators sent up one time when they asked for entertainment.
The boys had all wrinkled their noses at the books sent up for them, but she thought that reading them would be better than nothing. The book she started - Frankenstein by Mary Shelley - wasn't too bad. She found it was written a little oddly and there were many words she couldn't properly understand, but she was invested.
"Enjoying that book, are you?" A croaky voice from beside her made her nearly slip out of the chair, and realise that she had been sat on the very edge in suspense.
Snapping the book shut, she met the sleepy gaze of Newt, who was blinking up at her sheepishly. Her eyes softened at the sight of him, and she pulled her chair forwards so she was in reach of his hand.
Newt watched as she interlocked their fingers, the girl looking at him as though she had to keep him close or he'd vanish. He was still disoriented from the meds and the injury, but he knew exactly why he was being looked at as though he could break.
"Before you lecture me, or whatever, can I just explain how I was feeling?"
Her hand slipped from him then, as she straightened up in her seat, her jaw slacked. She fixed him with a gobsmacked expression, and despite his exhausted mind, he shrugged exaggeratedly.
"Newt, I'm not going to lecture you. I'm- I wouldn't."
She wouldn't be able to fully explain why Newt's wording choice knocked the air out of her lungs in an awful way. It just caused an ache in her heart that he'd expect her to be so harsh after something like this.
In her mind, she'd obviously done something to make him feel like that. She didn't know that his thoughts were jumbled and disorganised and just wrong.
"I just want to listen to you." She settled on saying, feeling satisfied at the relieved look on his face.
He shifted in his seat, catching sight of his leg then, and becoming immediately side tracked. He clutched at the sheets over him, snatching them away, and wincing when he moved too much.
"Be careful." She muttered, which he ignored, as he leaned forwards to look at it.
"How bad?"
"Broken in three places."
He cursed under his breath, his teeth tugging on his bottom lip hard enough to draw blood. Then he remembered what he was going to say to her.
"I did it cause it felt like something was missing. I was just empty. I couldn't handle everyone acting like everything was okay, like we hadn't all forgotten about ours lives before this place."
She let a silence fall between them for a few minutes, trying to work out the best way to respond. And the best way to respond without bursting into tears.
"Newt, it's okay that you don't want to pretend things are okay. It's just the way some people cope, and it doesn't work for others and that's fine."
Newt's face visibly flooded with relief, as if he was expecting to discover he was the only one that felt that way. In reality, lots of people could relate to him. Clara definitely could.
"Please, just talk to us. You're not alone here, we're all going through the same thing."
"I will talk to you, I will." And when she looked at his wide eyes, she knew he meant it. "I don't want to hurt any of you."
"We love you, Newt. You mean a lot to a lot of people here."
Newt's eyes began to glisten with tears, as if the words hit him hard. And they had. Because, it just so happened that, "I didn't know that."
He replied, his eyelids drooping with tiredness, but his eagerness keeping him awake. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be." She squeezed his hand tighter, and felt him squeeze hers back. "You know it now, and you're here. That's all that matters."
For a few minutes, they merely just sat, appreciating one another. Clara had never felt so grateful for someone as she did then. She had never felt as grateful as she did to have Newt beside her, knowing that if things had gone differently, he may not have been there.
"Hey,"
She whispered to him again, squeezing his hand to stop him from closing his eyes again. She felt a little bad in doing so, but knew he wouldn't mind when she spoke again.
"I'll go get Minho."
Firstly, Newt's eyes lit up in hope of seeing the other Runner again. And then, that vanished, quicker than a flash. Fear came in its place, and the boy's hand latched out on her arm before she could turn away.
"He's going to be angry." He spoke in such a small voice that Clara almost didn't catch it.
When the girl registered his words, it took every fibre in her being to stop herself from breaking down right there and then. She knew Minho was most likely driving himself and everyone else insane with worry outside of the room, and she knew that the boy would be anything but angry with him when finding out he was awake.
"He'll be relieved to see you're okay."
"Promise?"
If you listened carefully, you could probably hear the sound of Clara's heart shattering into a thousand pieces. It was Newt's terrified eyes that was breaking her heart.
"I promise."
The blonde boy still looked apprehensive, but his hand dropped its tight grip on her arm, allowing her to leave. She flashed him one last smile, and then felt grateful that her back was turned when her face began to crumple.
She closed the door gently behind her, expecting to have to go out into the Glade to search for the boy. She should've anticipated that he'd be waiting right outside the doorway, pacing anxiously and messing up his usually perfect hair.
"Well?" He asked expectantly, and although she longed for the comfort she knew that if she enveloped him in a hug, he'd dissolve in worry.
"He's awake. Go to him."
It didn't take another word from her for the boy to listen.
Minho swept past her as if he had been waiting for the moment his entire life, moving quicker than he probably ever did in the Maze. And when he reached Newt, he leapt on him with a hug that Clara would be stupid to presume them just friends.
Somehow, despite the eagerness to engulf Newt in an embrace, Minho was careful to not hurt the boy. The blonde in return clung onto his back, his head buried in the other's chest as he whispered to him quietly.
It was obvious now that they felt like more than just friends to one another. The girl was uncertain as to whether they had realised it, but it was clear to see. Minho's shameless flirting, Newt's flushed cheeks, their inseparableness.
How didn't she figure it out before?
She guessed she thought it was a joke. That Minho was simply teasing the blonde boy with fake affectionate words, gestures and actions. But now, it was beyond obvious how much Minho cared for the boy.
Deciding to leave the loved up boys alone for a moment together, Clara realised that she'd have to tell Newt another day that he could no longer be a Runner.