◦〄◦ 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐋𝐕𝐄 ◦〄◦
━━ʟᴏᴏᴋɪɴɢ ᴏᴜᴛ ғᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜ
"𝙱𝙴 𝙰 𝙳𝙴𝙰𝚁 𝙰𝙽𝙳 𝙷𝙴𝙻𝙿 𝙼𝙴"
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JOSEPHINE'S EYES NARROWED, TRYING TO FOCUS HER SIGHT ON THE CREATURE THAT THOMAS HAD ONCE FOUGHT.
"You mean, besides a Griever pancake?", Frypan joked. Jo inspected the dead Griever's body, her eyes roaming throughout the robotic structure. Minho headed forward, placing himself besides the dead creature. "Whoa, what are you doing?", Thomas exclaimed, his voice laced with worry. "Minho, wait, don't do anything stupid", Jo cautioned towards the boy.
Minho glanced at the girl, giving her a reassuring stare before he placed his hand between the walls that enclosed the Griever.
Silence was met as Minho moved his hand around, trying hard to find something, anything at all. The group all watched Minho, their bodies alert. However, Jo observed the Griever instead, noticing its robotic like leg twitch in the slightest way possible. "Minho, get your hand out of there, NOW!", Jo shouted, but it was too late, the Griever had moved.
The group of kids pulled Minho back as his body jumped out of the Griever's grasp. Jo pulled him towards her, checking his hand for any open wounds. "It's okay, I'm okay", Minho told the worried girl. "Stupid boy", she muttered under her breath, a sigh of relief following after it.
"I thought you said it was dead!", Frypan exclaimed, his tone in disbelief. "Was it a reflex?", asked Zart, his eyes switching off between Thomas and Minho, who both looked just as confused. "You hope", Winston exclaimed. "No, it seemed as more of a precaution, like as if it's shutting down", Jo informed her thoughts. "Shutting down?", Thomas asked, "What do you mean?"
Jo looked at him, her eyes darting around the group, "Think about it. Whoever put us here, they had to have designed everything. The Glade, the Maze, the Grievers. They aren't born, they're created." "So what? Their mission is to kill?", Frypan asked as he let out a scoff. "Something like that", Jo said, nodding her head along.
She glanced back at the mechanical body embedded between the grey walls, "Come on, let's try to pull it out." Jo walked forwards, crouching down to grab a piece of the body, the rest of the group following her footsteps. They all reached down, gripping a part of the cold metal.
"On three. One, two, three!", Thomas counted down as the group grunted, picking the Griever up from the floor and yanking it back. With heavy grunts, the body soon laid on the floor, no longer trapped. The group fell onto the floor, deep breaths escaping their lips.
Thomas picked himself up, offering Jo a helping hand, which she accepted as her body lifted up from the rough ground. He then offered everybody else a hand, leaving Jo to dust herself off. Minho walked forward once more, crouching down to retrieve what seemed to be a metal tube encased inside the Griever's mutated body. He picked up the item up to his eye line, turning it in small circles, analyzing each inch of it.
"What is it?", Jo asked out to the boy, who only proceeded to stick his hand inside the body part, a strange noise coming from the cause of the movement. The metal tube, with letterings and a small screen placed on it, was released from the Griever's body. Minho tossed the robotic cartilage onto the ground, causing the boys to exclaim in disgust. Jo to rolled her eyes at their reaction, letting out a quick snort.
"What the hell is that?", Thomas asked out in confusion. Minho continued to turn the tube around his hands, causing Jo to move closer to his side, wanting to examine the strange item as well. "Interesting", Minho let out.
"A seven?", Jo asked out, her voice full of curiosity as she observed a red seven on the small screen placed on the tube. "Okay, whatever it is...can we take this up back at the Glade?", Frypan asked, "Because I don't want to meet this guy's friends."
Though a Griever laid in front of her eyesight, Jo had almost forgotten that she was inside the walls that mocked her every day, too astonished by the new clues. "He's right, it's getting late", Minho spoke. "Come on", he commanded, walking over the Griever's dead body, heading to lead the group back to the Glade.
"Wait", Jo shouted, causing the group to stop their tracks and look back at the girl who still towered over the body. "Zart, Winston, pass me your bags", she commanded at the boys. "What are you doing?", Minho asked the girl, confusion meeting his face.
Winston passed Jo his bag, who then emptied its contents into Zart's bag. "Here", she said to Winston, passing him his bag that now doubled in weight.
"Jo, what are you doing?", Minho repeated again. "I have a theory", she said as she crouched down next to the Griever. "A theory?", asked Thomas, his voice going up. "Yes, maybe I can break this thing apart and analyze its structure. Now be a dear, and help me detach this piece", she told the boy, as she gestured to the stinger of the Griever's body.
"Jo, I don-", Minho started to caution, however he was soon interrupted by the irritated girl. "You almost lost your hand to a simple twitch because of this thing. Now, help me", she commanded again, her voice starting to be laced with annoyance.
Thomas and Minho crouched down next to the girl, placing their own hands opposite of the stinger, pulling back as the girl pulled the opposite direction. And with a small clicking noise, the stinger had been amputated from the rest of the body, finding its new home inside Zart's bag.
She looked up at the curly blond boy, "Zart, I promise I will make you a new one." "Yeah you and what skills", he mocked, a small laugh coming from him and Frypan. "You break my heart", Jo smiled as she placed her hand over her chest. "We should get going", Thomas said, causing the small joy to die down, darting his eyes from the girl to the boys.
"Yeah, yeah let's go", Jo agreed, nodding her head along with the rest of the group. The group jogged off, Jo not afraid to look at the walls this time around.
Soon enough the six kids had found their way back to the Glade, panting their way towards Newt and Gally, awaiting not far from the entrance. "God, I am out of shape", exclaimed Frypan, earning a loud and sudden laugh from Jo. "Fry...stop...you're going to make me faint!", she said in between laughs.
The five boys looked at the laughing girl, whose face was red in glee. They couldn't help but laugh along. As they reached Newt and Gally's figures, Newt quickly embraced the girl in a hug, and continued to pat the backs of the fellow boys. "What did you guy's find?", Gally spoke, his eyes roaming across the six people. "Come on, let's go somewhere private", Thomas spoke to both the boys, the rest of the groups heads nodding in agreement. They made their way into a private location, away from any listening ears.
Thomas handed the metal tube that was once encased inside a monster towards Newt, "We found this. It was inside a Griever." Newt examined the small item, his hands tracing over the letters imprinted on it spelling out, "W.K.C.D". "These are the same letters we get in our supplies", he spoke. "Yeah, whoever put us here obviously made the Grievers. Just as how Jo had said", Thomas spoke, meeting Jo's stare at his last statement, earning him a small smile from the girl. Thomas returned a small smile of his own, continuing his statement.
"This is the first real clue, the first anything, you've found in over three years. Right, Minho", Thomas asked. "Right", Minho responded, briefly nodding his head in agreement. "Newt, we gotta go back out there. Who knows where this might lead us", Thomas spoke, his confidence rising every time the group nodded their heads along in agreement. A small silence roamed, broken off by Gally.
"You see what he is trying to do, right? First, he breaks our rules...then he tries to convince us to abandon them totally. The rules are the only thing that have ever held us together. Why are we now questioning that? If Alby was her-", Gally spoke out in irritation, before getting cut off by Jo.
"You do not speak for Alby, got it? And don't go out and about the rules, you out of people shouldn't get a say on what should and shouldn't be followed," Jo spoke all in one breath, an annoyed scoff concluding her rant. "Jo, look I know that you're worried but he is only making it worse", Gally spoke, shooting a glare at Thomas, "This shank needs to be punished." "Shu-", Jo began to speak, wanting to give Gally another lecture on respect, however before she could speak, her voice was cut off by Newt.
"You're right", he said, turning to look at Gally after he handed the metal tube back onto Minho's hands. "Thomas broke the rules. One night in the pit, and no food", Newt spoke. "Oh come on, Newt! One night in the pit? Do you think that's gonna stop him from going into the Maze", Gally exclaimed in disbelief, his hands waving up in the air, causing Jo to roll her eyes. "No", Newt answered, "And we can't just have non-Runners running into the Maze whenever they feel like it." Newt glanced at Jo, who only stared him down, daring him to disagree with her opinion, "So let's just make this official. Starting from tomorrow, you're a Runner."
Thomas looked back at Newt, his eyes brightening at his last words, while the rest of the group mirrored his expression, nodding their heads. "Wow", Gally scoffed, starting to storm off. "Gally..", Frypan said, turning his body to reason with the angered boy. "No, Fry", he exclaimed, hitting Frypan's arm off his own, causing Frypan to follow him out.
"I'll take this, you wouldn't want anyone to accidentally sting themselves", Winston told Jo with a laugh as he gestured towards the bad gripped in the girl's hands. "You're right. Thank you", she told him as she handed him the bad and watched him and Zart walk out.
"Thanks, Newt", Thomas told the boy, who only looked back at him for a moment before finding his way out, leaving only Thomas, Jo and Minho alone. "You think he'll forgive us?", Jo asked out to the two boys. "Who?", Thomas asked, his eyebrows furrowing. "Gally", she responded, a scoff coming out of the hazel-eyed boy.
"It's not funny, Thomas. You can't expect people to line up their lives for your actions. You can't just expect them to...trust you", she said, her voice dying down with each word said. Thomas glanced at the girl leaning on a wooden log and then at the Minho who only stared at his feet.
"I-I don't just expect it. But I swear, I swear on my life that I would never do anything to harm you, any of you", Thomas spoke, his voice faintly cracking at the end of his statement, causing the two figures to look up at him. "I believe you", Minho told the boy, glancing towards the girl, signaling to say something.
"Since your arrival...you have broken several rules, Ben has been banished due to attacking you and you have killed a Griever", Jo spoke, as if she was teaching a lesson, counting off all of his foolish actions. "But somehow...somehow amongst all this chaos, I can't seem to not follow your stupid ideas", she spoke in a surprised tone, scoffing.
Thomas stared at the girl, a sincere smile starting to be placed onto his lips. "It doesn't mean I trust you. It means that in the whole year that I have been stuck here, feeling doomed. You have started something that has broken off that feeling and for that I am grateful. No trust, but grateful", she repeated, staring back at the boy, who though wished for more of an answer, was still satisfied.
"You have such a way with words, Jo", Minho laughed as he patted the girl's back, earning a playful eye roll from the girl and a small laugh from Thomas. "Come on", Minho told them both, "I have something I want to show you guys."
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━━━━━━ AUTHOR SPEAKS !
I also have a passion for making Thomas simp over Jo, it just gives me joy!!
Also I love adding Zart, Frypan and Winston moments because I feel as if they aren't appreciated enough.
I love any kind of interaction, always makes my day :))
━━━━ SONG OF THE CHAPTER
𝙻𝙾𝙾𝙺𝙸𝙽𝙶 𝙾𝚄𝚃 𝙵𝙾𝚁 𝚈𝙾𝚄 ➝ 𝙹𝙾𝚈 𝙰𝙶𝙰𝙸𝙽
"ᴊᴜsᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴀʏ ʏᴏᴜ'ʀᴇ ɢʟᴀɴᴄɪɴɢ ᴀᴛ ᴍᴇ,
sᴏᴍᴇᴛʜɪɴɢ ᴀʙᴏᴜᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴊᴜsᴛ ᴍᴀᴋᴇs ᴍᴇ ғᴇᴇʟ ɢᴜɪʟᴛʏ ғᴏʀ ʟɪᴋɪɴɢ ʏᴏᴜ"
0:41 ───|───────── 2:59
|◁ II ▷|
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