THE STREETS OUTSIDE OF THE CITY
reminded Evie of the time, when they were looking for Marcus in the scorch. People were everywhere, sitting under the last materials they could scrape together to build a shelter with it. The smell of all sorts of substances and diseases came to Evie's nose, so she pulled her ski mask over it.
They pushed their way through the crowd towards the wall.

"The city here has really gone downhill!" said Jorge.

"We have to stay together!" Shouted Thomas, who was running ahead as usual.

From further away, someone could be heard talking through a speaker. However, the words were too indistinct to understand as the people were too loud. A car drove through the crowd and the groups made way for it. Masked and armed men were sitting on the roof of the vehicle and ran their eyes through the crowd.

One of them let his gaze linger on Evie and her friends. They were all wearing gas masks, presumably to protect their bodies from the virus. Evie heard a high-pitched whirring sound and looked up. Drones were flying above them.
Thomas seemed to notice them too.

Evie pulled her hood over her head, as they walked on through the streets, through a narrow corridor and came to a large crowd of people.

"Let us in!" they kept shouting. They held up posters.

'WCKD is the disease!'

"That's it! That's our way in," said Thomas and walked purposefully to the front. They followed him and pushed their way through the crowd.

"Thomas. This isn't what you're looking for! All these people want to go in there and you wanna find something they already failed looking for?" Jorge shouted over the clamor.

"I'm so close, I won't turn back!" Thomas responded steadfast.

Stubborn as always.
It probably ran in the family.

"What have we gotten ourselves into?" Frypan said besides the blonde girl. Evie looked around and spotted those men in masks again, one of them, she thought it was the one from earlier, remained standing calmly on one spot and kept staring at her.

Evie had an uneasy feeling. She looked at Newt, who also saw the man and looked around suspiciously. They arrived at the front.

"Thomas, something's wrong here!" said Jorge.

"Hey guys, we need to get out of here now. See that?" said Newt, pointing at the masked men. They were suddenly everywhere.

Suddenly a loud roar could be heard and the crowd suddenly fell silent. Huge devices on the rooftops of the wall moved and aimed themselves at the mass of people. When Evie realized what it was, her heart stopped.
The others seemed to recognize it too and took off running. Newt grabbed the blonde girl by the arm and pulled her along. Shots rained down on them. People flew through the air and the ground was blown up.

Newt pulled Evie around the corner. She coughed from all the dust and smoke swirling through the air and held her arm over her mouth. They ran on. But the masked men from earlier confronted them. Newt was grabbed roughly by the collar. Two strong arms wrapped around Evie's upper body and lifted her up. She kicked around.

"GET OFF!" Newt screamed and broke free. But he was grabbed again.
Evie managed to get up on the ground, but was then grabbed roughly by the back of the neck and pushed into a van. Newt landed next to her.

"Are you okay?" he whispered. Evie answered him with a nod. She pushed down her hood and mask, so she could catch her breath.
Two of the masked men sat down opposite them and the van drove off.
Evie wanted to ask them what all this was about, but they didn't look like they were going to give her an answer.

It was worth a try.

"Where are you taking us?"
No answer.

Ah shit.

—

The van took a sharp right into some building, then the doors of the vehicle opened and they got pulled out. Evie kept close to Newt's side in case they tried to pull them apart again.
Another van pulled up and Thomas and Brenda got out.
Suddenly, the doors of one of the stationary vans were pushed open and one of the masked men flew out onto the ground. Jorge jumped on top of him and grabbed him by the collar.

"WHERE IS SHE?!" he shouted. A great confusion of shouting arose. They tried to drag him away, but were held back with their weapons raised.

"Okay okay! It's okay." Newt yelled with his arms raised. Evie had her arms raised too.

"Hey hey! I'm here!" Brenda talked to Jorge and he calmed down. The whole situation defused itself in an instant.

"Okay calm down we're all on the same side!" Shouted one of the guys. It was the one who had been staring at Evie.

"If we were on the same side, you wouldn't have dragged us here, you bastard!" Evie threw at him, but he ignored it.

"On the same side? Who the hell are you?" Thomas now asked and tore himself away from the people. The guy looked at him for a moment, then took off his mask and Evie was left breathless.

"Hey greenie." he said calmly.

"Gally?" Thomas murmured.

A swarm of memories came to Evie as if a box had been opened in her mind. She saw him standing in front of Chuck's body. The gun in his hands, when Minho killed him with a Speer.
Him as Chucks murderer.

Thomas's eye twitched as he stared at the blond. He stepped towards Gally, took a swing and punched him right in the face.
Gally fell backwards, to the ground.
The situation quickly escalated again. The men around them raised their weapons and took aim at Thomas. He was now bent over the blond boy, had grabbed him by his protective vest and raised his fist again to strike. However, Newt quickly ran between them and grabbed his arm. Evie looked around and felt the tension in the air, which made her feel uneasy.

"Stop, stop!" Newt hissed, looking intently at Thomas. Evie could literally taste the tension in the air between the two of them. No one dared to move.

"He killed Chuck." Thomas grumbled, barely audible. His fist was shaking.

"Yes, I know, I know! I remember, I was there too." Newt told him. His eyes flitted to Gally. He looked at Thomas tensely, waiting for the brunette to strike again.

"But what I also remember is that he was infected and half out of his mind!" hissed Newt.

"Alright?!" He asked, then looked around at the raised weapons.
Evie considered stopping the man with the raised gun next to her and snatching the gun from his hand, which was pointed at Newt. However, she decided against it, as it would probably only make the situation worse.

Newt whispered something that no one could understand. Thomas looked again at the boy below him. Evie could see that he was struggling with himself, before he broke away and took a few steps back.
He stood next to his sister, as if he was getting ready to protect her if the men went into defense again.
The tension in the room slowly eased as Gally struggled to his feet. Evie watched his every move as if she were a predatory cat. She eyed him, tugging at everything in her to go after him.

Gally had grown a lot taller, and a lot stockier than Thomas or Newt. You couldn't tell he'd had a spear thrust into his chest half a year ago.
His eyebrows weren't quite as bushy as they used to be, but they still had the same strange shape and his face had become rounder.
Gally grabbed his jaw.

"Kinda saw that headin' ", he murmured, as if he hardly cared. Evie clenched her hands into fists again when she heard the arrogance in his tone.

"Anybody else? Fry? Newt?" Gally asked the group.

"Oh, I've got plenty more," growled Evie, striding towards him quickly when she'd had enough of his cockiness. Her fist also landed in his face as one of the armed men grabbed her and shoved her aside.

"Get your filthy hands off me!" She yelled. All around the girl were now shouts between her people and Gally's people.

"Let her go!" Thomas shouted. Evie was let go and walked back to the center. Gally had grabbed his nose.

"Ah." came out of his mouth as he leaned forward and held his nose in pain. A hand gripped Evie's. Newt leaned down to her ear.

"Leave it. He's not worth it." the blond said. Gally looked Evie up and down.

"Evie." he mumbled.

"Let my name cross your tongue one more time and you won't have a tongue." The blonde girl snatched her hand from Newt's grasp and crossed her arms in front of her chest. Evie thought she heard a light laugh from the men, which only made her angrier.

"Do you know him?" asked Jorge, who seemed completely confused about the situation. Frypan looked at Gally with a sad expression.

"He was my friend." He then replied. Gally looked between him and the floor so that you could almost think he was feeling guilty.

"How.. how is that possible I don't-.." Newt began to stammer.

"We watched you die!" he then said uncomprehendingly.

"No, you left me to die." the man said and Evie immediately interrupted him.

"Apologies! We were busy watching Chuck's life getting sucked out of his body!"
Newt tried to put a hand on the girl's shoulder, but she slapped his arm away.
Gally looked at the blonde girl for a moment as if he was annoyed by her and then just carried on talking.

"And if we hadn't found you, you'd be dead now!" he looked intently at Evie with the last words. The girl laughed in amusement.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Gally then asked.

"Minho." Newt began to speak again when no one else took the opportunity to speak.

"WCKD has him. We're looking for a way in." he explained the situation. A silence fell.
Evie looked at Gally's jaw, which was already forming the red frame of a bruise and his nose started to bleed.

"I can help you with that!" He replied, as if he had completely forgotten that they had just attacked him.

"Follow me." He then said, grabbed his nose again and wanted to turn around.
When Evie saw Gally's face grimace as he touched his nose, she was pleased with herself.

"I'm not going anywhere with you." Thomas said. Evie defiantly crossed her arms in front of her chest and tried to shoot holes in Gally's head with her looks.

"Have it your way man, but I can lead you through these walls." Gally replied, shrugging his shoulders. Thomas thought about it and finally followed him.

Where had the stubbornness gone?
A shame for the family.

Authors note:
I'll never forget, how shocked I was when I watched this scene for the first time.

I mean seriously, Chuck dies from a tiny bullet in his chest, but Gally survives a whole spear?!

-