ACT I SCENE XXXVIII
HELEN

   CASSANDRA WOKE up to chatter and opened her eyes to find the boys sitting around the carpeted floor eating from tin cans. She groaned and stretched her legs over the sofa, earning glances her way.

"Cassie!" Minho shot up excitedly and went over to her. "Good timing, we were just talking about heading back out."

He poked her side out of habit and she flinched. "Ow! What the shuck, Minho!" she cried out angrily and his eyes widened in shock.

"Shuck, Cassie! I totally forgot, sorry!" he exclaimed and laughter chorused around the room.

"Honestly, I don't know whether I want to throw up, laugh or cry whenever I look at them," Archie remarked.

"All the time, man," Newt grumbled. "That's how I feel all the time."

She swatted Minho away and pushed herself up grumpily to rub her eyes. Then she paused and looked around apprehensively while trying to keep her heart rate at a normal pace. "Um, guys..." she started hesitantly. "Where...are we? How did we get here? What happened after we left the tunnels?"

"Oh, no," Minho moaned. "What are they doing to you this time?"

She looked at him with horrified eyes. WICKED had definitely done something to her when they took her that first night and now her memory blackouts were different. They were getting longer. "Did something bad happen? Where's Thomas?"

"It's fine, relax," Newt soothed. "He and Brenda just got separated from us. Jorge's trying to find a signal outside to locate 'em. He confessed that he was working for WICKED, remember?"

Most of it was just a blank, but there were some vague scenes that she was able to recall. Jorge came back in just then and told them that he managed to pinpoint Thomas' location.

"You're gonna love this, Cassie." Minho dragged a heavy crate over to her. She went forwards and knelt by his side, her eyes instantly lighting up excitedly. Her hands reached into the crate and pulled out a sword sheathed in smooth lacquered wood, examining it in awe under the dim light.

"I've been shucked and went to heaven," she said.

"It suits you," Newt commented. "Brings out your eyes. Merciless. Soulless. Empty as a friggin' black hole."

She grinned at him. "Thanks, Newton."

Jorge started explaining how to get to Thomas and Brenda's whereabouts; it would only take them less than an hour. The Gladers packed their stuff, grabbed more food, and proceeded to crawl out of the safe house one by one. Cassandra emerged onto the dusty street, taking a look around as dawn started to peek over the broken buildings that surrounded them. Newt came after her, then Archie and Frypan.

They gathered around the entrance until Jorge finally joined them, rolling the cement slab over the hole again. Surprisingly, the desolate land felt cool in the early morning and Cassandra actually had to put on her jacket. Jorge led them down the street, slupping through a couple of alleyways and walking across dilapidated houses. It didn't take them that long to reach their destination and the sky was still a purplish hue above, with only streaks of orange starting to paint the horizon.

"We should split up," Jorge suggested as he checked his device again. "They should be around here."

"We'll split up then." Minho nodded his head. "Meet back here within the hour."

The Gladers agreed before splitting themselves up. Minho, Newt and Cassandra chose to go down a side street on their left. They crossed the road when they met with a collapsed building that blocked the rest of their path. Splinters of glass littered the fragmented pavement and there were endless piles of debris lining the sides. Every now and then, they heard the odd sound of someone crying or singing, or wailing miserably into the sky.

Then Cassandra stopped in her tracks when she saw something by the wall, tugging Minho and Newt to a halt in front of her. They looked at her with a raised eyebrow as she stared at the landmark.

"Look up there," she told them and they followed her gaze. Words were scrawled along the side of a building.

THOMAS, YOU'RE THE REAL LEADER.

They stared at the inscription written with large capital letters in a stunned silence. The sun had started to peek over the buildings and the rays of light glinted off the fragmented glass. Finally, Cassandra stirred and shifted her feet uncomfortably. "Guess this means Minho isn't the leader anymore."

"Well, congratulations, Minho," Newt said dryly. "You're officially off the hook now."

"What the shuck?" he asked, almost angrily. "All this time, I've been doing that shank's work for him? Dude, he owes me big time."

"Minho." Cassandra scrunched her face up. "Can you actually imagine the kind of klunk he would lead us in to?"

"Now that you mention it..."

Suddenly a small scuffle broke out on the street half a block away from them. Two men were trying to beat the crap out of each other with rubber chickens that made the stupidest sounds imaginable. It would have been a hilarious sight, if a dozen more Cranks hadn't started to gather around to egg them on maliciously.

"Time to go," Minho announced.

A few of the children had come out of their hiding spots when most of the adults went to watch the debacle behind them. They darted across the streets one by one, trying to scavenge away scraps that were left behind. Soon, they were back on the other side of the street past the collapsed building and heading in the direction of their rendezvous point.

A few of the search parties had returned ahead of them, each reporting that they came to a dead end and had to turn back. None of them saw any signs of Thomas or Brenda. They sat around the broken debris, picking up random things here and there as they waited for the rest to return.

"Hey!"

Cassandra looked up with a frown. "You guys hear that?"

"Hey!"

"It's Fry." Archie pointed in the distance as the Cook came running back to them, waving his arms in the air with a wide grin on his face.

"Reckon he found something?" Newt asked.

"I hope so, he looks way too pleased with himself to be running from Cranks," Minho grumbled.

The boy in question finally reached them and bent over to catch his breath, taking big gulps of air to fill his lungs. Cassandra threw a small pebble at his foot. "C'mon, tell us what you got," she urged.

"I found 'em," he gasped. "The both of 'em. In some alleyway back there, they were forced into some kinda Crank party at gunpoint by some blonde dude."

"Tell us more about this party, Fry," Minho ordered. "Did you see how many were inside? What were they doing?"

Frypan shrugged. "I don't know, man. It looked like there were a lot of them, all crazy and drugged up."

Jorge suddenly jumped down from his perch on top of a large mountain of bricks, his boots thumping heavily against the broken concrete. He pumped his fist into a hand and smirked widely. "Well, let's go get them back."

They took cover in a derelict house right opposite the alley where the party was at. Loud and heavy bass music thumped incessantly in the dry air. Cassandra went to check out the house and spotted a flight of stairs that was still intact. She immediately darted forwards to it and ascended the steps to the first floor of the house. Minho called after her before following her upstairs. The wooden floorboards creaked loudly as she put her weight on them and she tried to tread as carefully as she could.

The corridor ahead of her led into four rooms, with the first door on her right leading towards a bathroom that was disgusting and full of mould. She was definitely not going in there even if her life depended on it. The door opposite it was locked, or jammed stuck, so she moved on to the next one just as Minho arrived on the landing. He watched her with a raised eyebrow as she snooped around the long abandoned home.

Only the last room looked to be in an acceptable condition and she pushed the door open wider to step inside. It looked like it had belonged to a girl; there was a white vanity table next to the door and a large matching wardrobe opposite it. The chipped and faded wall had once been painted a pale mauve and stained posters of handsome boys littered one side of the room. She walked towards the vanity and wiped the dust off the mirror's surface with her sleeve. Holy crap, her hair was a mess.

Minho stepped inside and looked around, stopping in the very middle of the room. There was a dirty four poster bed behind her with a ripped canopy that hung pitifully from the wooden frame. Cassandra continued to fuss over her appearance in the mirror when there was a loud crack of wood splintering apart. Turning around, she found Minho's foot had gone straight through the floorboard underneath him and she tried to hold in her snort.

"Minho, I think you need to lose some weight," she said with a completely straight face.

He looked at her in mock outrage. "Are you calling me fat?!"

She bit her bottom lip in a futile effort to stop the laughter but her body shook from it. He lifted his foot out of the hole and cocked his head to the side before bending down.

"Whoa. Look at this." He reached into the hole and pulled out an assault rifle.

Her eyes widened in excitement and she darted forwards to examine it. "Holy crap, are there still rounds in it?"

Minho cocked the weapon and pulled the charging handle all the way back, then turned it onto its side to look into the firing chamber. "It's empty. Hang on." He reached back into the hole and pulled out a couple of magazines with a grin. "Oh, yeah, that's what I'm talking about."

Setting the magazines aside, he punched the empty one out, rode the bolt forward while keeping pressure on the charging spring then cocked the safety on. He slid a new magazine below the trigger and there was a click as the catch engaged and he slapped the bottom to make sure it stayed put. Positioning the butt of the stock against his shoulder, he peered through the scope and glanced sideways at her with a small smirk.

"How do I look?" he asked.

"You look pretty hot," she answered.

His smirk grew even wider as he set the rifle back down and pulled her forwards to press his lips against hers. Cassandra gripped the collar of his jacket and kissed him like there was no tomorrow. They lost balance and fell back onto the floor with a heavy thud. Newt shouted from below, "You two better not be smacking!"

Cassandra had to press a hand against her mouth to suppress her laughter. Minho collapsed on the floor and shuddered in silent hysterics. She covered her face as her sides started to sting but she couldn't stop laughing.

"I swear he's spying on us," she wheezed.

"How does he do it?" Minho snorted as a fresh wave of laughter took over him again.

After regaining some semblance of composure, he lugged the gun and ammo together with his pack and stood up. Minho offered Cassandra a hand which she took to pull herself back onto her feet. "Let's go rescue our Golden Boy," she said.