Disclaimer:

I do not own The Maze Runner, and because of that I'm going to spend the day watching Glee and fawning over Grant Gustin because it is his birthday today

-✼-

I laid uncomfortably in my cot that night, my mind haunted by images of Ben for the second time in a row. I wasn't sure if Minho was asleep or not because I couldn't hear him snoring, but I didn't bother to check.

The door creaked open and my head snapped up to see who had entered. Minho was the first to say something, confirming that he was, in fact, just as awake as I was.

"What the shuck do you want?" he snapped rudely, voice gravelly from exhaustion. I turned to see him lying still, spread out on his bed with his face buried in his pillow. His blankets were thrown all over the place like he was having a hard time getting comfortable. It gave me a strange sense of confirmation that I wasn't the only one with sleep problems that night.

The figure in the doorway was dark from the light shining behind them, so I couldn't see their face. Then they spoke and I no longer had to guess who it was.

"I've come to extract Dylan from this room," Newt announced in a pretend deep, formal voice.

"Why?" I asked, rubbing my tired eyes and sitting up.

"Yeah, why?" Minho grumbled. "Actually, I don't care. Just shut the door and let me get some sleep, you shank."

Newt had no visible reaction to Minho's sass. "Dylan's moving into my room."

"What?" Minho and I asked in sync. I watched as my friend's face popped out from his pillow and looked in Newt's direction, confusion apparent on his features. His black hair was a disheveled mess on top of his head from so much tossing and turning.

"We're roomies!" Minho protested childishly, propping his head up with his hand. "We have such fun together!" He paused, realizing what he said. "Not like that. I was planning a bunch of cool sleepover stuff! We were gonna play Truth or Dare, Would You Rather, Charades, and paint our nails and do makeovers! Then we would stay up all night talking about the cutest guy in the Glade!"

"It's you, Minho," I told him with a smile, playing along with his joke.

"Who else?" Minho scoffed in an arrogant voice, pretending to clean his nails. "Everyone knows I have the most muscle."

"Where would you even get nail polish?" Newt asked, completely ignoring the second half of our conversation.

Minho shrugged. "You never know what's gonna come up in the Box." He sat up and dug around underneath his bed for a few seconds, hanging upside down from his mattress. "Yesterday I found these huge bandages Dylan was hiding at the foot of her bed."

And to my absolute horror, he held up a box of pads.

My face went bright red and I wanted to fall off a cliff at that moment. Embarrassment washed over me like a tsunami and dragged me under until I felt like crying. I could barely squeak out, "How did you even find those?"

"I clean up sometimes," Minho defended. "These were under your blankets." He pulled out a few loose tampons still in their wrappings. "Along with these popsicles."

Newt took the box and tampons from Minho and I nearly fell off my bed from how much embarrassment I was feeling. He studied them for a second before looking at me, his eyebrows creased. "Is this true? Is this what you took from the Box and wouldn't tell me what it was?"

I was so grateful for how dark it was. Newt couldn't see the redness of my face. "They aren't bandages or popsicles!"

Newt raised an eyebrow. "What are they, then?"

I couldn't think of a way to explain it. "It's girl stuff."

"Girl stuff?" Minho repeated, not convinced. "Please explain."

"I'd rather not," I confessed, shifting uncomfortably as Newt passed the objects back to Minho. "Please don't make me."

Newt nodded. "Okay; we won't make you-"

"I wanna know!" Minho protested childishly.

"No, Minho," Newt snapped. "You two distracted me. Dylan, c'mon, you're coming with me. Minho, give her back the bandages and popsicles that aren't bandages or popsicles."

I snatched the pads and tampons out of Minho's reluctant hands and grabbed all of my stuff, setting it on top of my cot so I could bring it all at once. With Newt's help, I carried it out of the room, which looked bare now that all of mine and Minho's stuff combined wasn't laying everywhere. Muttering one last "Bye" to him, I closed the door behind me and carried the cot down to Newt's room.

"Your face is really red," Newt observed quietly, concern evident on his face. "Did we embarrass you?"

Deciding to just be honest instead of lying (which he would know I was), I admitted, "Yeah, sorta."

"I'm sorry," he apologized. "I won't say anything if that makes it any better."

I offered a small smile. "Thanks."

Newt kicked the door to his room open, walking backwards into it. We brought my cot to the empty side of his room, and I dumped all my stuff underneath it for the time being. I was too tired to do anything else.

Looking around the room, I noticed it was much neater compared to Minho's. Nothing was on the floor and Newt's bed was made - a bit messily, but still, it was made. Its setup was not-very-surprisingly similar to that of Minho's, which led me to believe that all of the Keeper's rooms were the same, furniture and layout-wise. The air smelled of grass and fresh air, and then I realized it was because the window was open, a cool breeze making its way into the room. Outside, I heard the sound of a few Gladers snoring loudly.

"When you want, you can move your clothes and stuff into the left side of the dresser," Newt said, pointing to the dresser that was identical to Minho's and was pushed against the far wall, separating our two beds. "I don't have much so feel free to use as much space as you need. If you want the window closed, that's fine, too."

"Thank you." I gave him a genuine smile that time. He was being really nice - not that he usually wasn't - and I could tell that maybe, just maybe, switching rooms so suddenly wouldn't be so confusing after all.

-/-

"I told ya, she's not wakin' up," a hushed voice whispered. "I've tried everything and she won't budge."

"Not if you talk like that, she won't," a louder voice said gruffly.

"Have you considered dumping her out of the cot?" This was apparently a serious question because they waited patiently for an answer.

"I'm not doing that!" the first voice exclaimed, their voice still a quiet hiss. "Look, I brought you guys in here to see if you could wake her up, not injure her."

"I still think the dumping would be a great option."

"Chuck, we are not dumping Dylan out of her bed," a new voice scolded. "However amusing it would be."

"What do you want us to do? Newt, this is wasting my time."

Suddenly, just as I was about to fall back asleep, I felt the bed tipping and I slid gradually until I fell. I landed roughly on the ground, a groan escaping my lips as I made contact with the floor. My sheets were wrapped around me tightly like a cocoon.

"Chuck!" Three voices shouted at once.

"It was so tempting!"

I opened my eyes, squinting to see Newt, Thomas, Alby, and Chuck standing above me. Alby looked more annoyed than I'd ever seen him and Thomas and Newt seemed shocked. Chuck was hiding his face in his hands like he was trying immensely hard not to laugh.

"Well, she's awake. I'm leaving now," Alby announced with a roll of his eyes, turning and leaving the room. "The next time you call me in here, it better be something more important than not being able to wake a Newbie up."

Newt sighed and rubbed his forehead with his hand while Thomas beamed down at me. "Rise and shine, Sleeping Ugly!" he cheered. Newt and Chuck looked at him strangely, but he didn't seem to care and neither did I. I accepted his hand and he pulled me up from the floor.

"That's funny," I said sarcastically, "considering you look like a walking, talking piece of klunk."

"If you two are done with your bantering," Newt interrupted pointedly as Chuck laughed his snorty, gurgling laugh that always made me grin. "Hurry on and get dressed and eat. You've got your jobs to do. Thomas, you're working with the Track-hoes. Dylan's with the Med-jacks."

"Why not the Blood House?" Thomas asked, looking offended. "Why isn't she working with Winston?"

"She would be," Newt replied, "but Clint and Jeff requested her for today. Heard she was doing well with the Builders and wanted to put her up to the test."

I sighed. That did not sound good.

After I had gotten dressed and eaten, I met Clint and Jeff by the Homestead.

"Hey, Dylan," Jeff greeted with a wave. I returned the gesture and smiled, though I wasn't really feeling the whole Med-jack thing.

"So, what do we do?" I asked.

"We take care of sick people, injuries, and especially coma girls," Clint replied, swinging the door to the Homestead open and allowing me to go in first. "She's our main priority right now. Don't need her dyin' on us. That would be bad on our part."

"And if we're not doing that," Jeff continued on, "we just wait for someone to hurt themselves. Really doesn't take long. Usually a Builder will smash their finger with a hammer or a Runner will get a badly pulled muscle. Slicers sometimes accidentally cut themselves with their knives and such, but they just need a band-aid and some disinfectant and that's it. It's an easy job, really."

"But you have to know how to do it," Clint added when we got to the second floor. "The end of the hall to the right is where we're goin'."

I followed his directions and took a deep breath before opening the door. I didn't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't absolute silence. I stepped inside to see the girl, appearing as she was sleeping, flat on her back and still as a rock with the covers pulled up to her neck. Her black hair fanned around her face and her lips were parted ever so slightly. On her forehead was a damp cloth. I noticed her face was shiny with sweat.

"She spikes fevers sometimes," Jeff explained. "We just gotta feed her soup and check on her temperature."

"She can eat?" I asked.

Jeff nodded and then smiled wryly. "Unless it's been Clint eating all of Frypan's mysterious soup this whole time, she can eat."

"It's hard to tell, but we suspect she'll be up soon." Clint shut the door and looked at the girl with his arms folded across his chest. "She mutters in her sleep more often. It's hard to understand what she's saying, though, it's so quiet and jumbled together."

I nodded in understanding. There was an awkward silence as we all just stared at the girl.

"So, what do you want me to do?" I asked slowly. The strange silence made me feel uneasy, especially with the coma girl laying a few feet away. It was unsettling.

"Glad you asked," Jeff said as he made his way over to the bowl of soup on the nightstand. He picked it up carefully. "You can start by-"

Suddenly, a kid burst into the room, gasping and holding onto his shoulder. Another boy was accompanying him, a frantic look on his face. His blond hair was unkempt, sticking up in various directions like he'd been electrocuted and didn't bother to smooth it back down.

"Clint, Jeff, his arm, it's popped out of its socket!" he cried, gray eyes wild with panic. Jeff set down the bowl of soup, spilling a quarter of it on the floor in the process, and quickly ran to the door while Clint observed the injury.

"We can fix it," Clint asserted, voice incredibly calm despite the situation. "We can fix it no problem. Gonna be real painful, though."

"I'll - do - anything," the injured boy gasped between words. His darkish face was shining with sweat, expression contorted in agonizing pain. I didn't know what he had been doing to get his arm like that, but I wasn't going to ask.

"Lay him down on the floor," Jeff instructed. "Dylan, come help. Garret, you go on. He'll be alright with us."

The kid's friend nodded and went off and out the door with one last worried glance at the boy. We managed to get the hurt Glader laying down with minor grunts of pain from him.

"Dylan, hold him down," Clint ordered, gritting his teeth. I put a hand on the boy's shoulder and the other on his chest to make sure he wouldn't get up. Clint grasped his arm. "Ready? One...two...three-!"

He snapped the kid's arm back into place and the latter let out a harsh scream of pain right into my ear, his body lifting up a bit. I winced, pushing him back down, my ear ringing.

The kid was gasping, chest heaving. His wide hazel eyes darted around the room. "Is it better?"

"You're okay," I told him with a relieved smile. "You're better."

"Take it easy for the next few days, Sam," Clint advised, patting his shoulder as he helped him to his feet. "It'll take a little while to heal, but you'll be fine."

The kid nodded. He was still breathing heavily as he said, "Thank you," before leaving and shutting the door.

"Wow," I marveled after he left. "That's what you guys do?"

"Yep." Jeff put his hands on his hips, letting out a slow breath. "Usually not that bad, though. S'rare that we ever get something popped out of its socket. You have to have the worst luck in the Glade, my friend."

"Yeah," Clint agreed. "Bleedin' from your head, traumatized from Ben, passin' out. What's gonna be next, huh? Are you gonna get Stung by a Griever?"

I chuckled uneasily and looked away, hoping his words wouldn't come true. I didn't want my luck to worsen.

-/-

By the time lunch rolled around, I was sure of one thing- there was no way I was going to be a Med-jack. I was horrible at comforting people who were in pain, and I kept mixing up the medical supplies and almost put the salt they used for the soup onto a person's bleeding cut instead of the disinfectant powder. That would not have ended well.

Sighing, I dragged myself to the Kitchens for some much-needed water and food. Despite not having done much, I was exhausted. And Thomas, I noticed, looked worse than I felt.

We got apples from Frypan and bottles of water. I plopped down next to Newt, happily munching on the fruit as Thomas sat beside Chuck, who was across from me. It took me two bites to realize that Newt was acting strangely.

I glanced over and noticed he looked terrible. His eyes were bloodshot, his hair falling over his forehead messily but unable to hide the worry lines in his skin. He was chewing on his fingernails, which I didn't think was very sanitary at all.

"What's wrong with him?" Chuck whispered not-so-quietly to Thomas. "Looks like you did when you got out of the Box."

"I don't know," Thomas responded, voice hushed. "Why don't you go ask him?"

"I can hear every bloody word you guys are saying," Newt informed in a loud voice. "No wonder people hate sleepin' next to you shanks."

I didn't even laugh like I usually would. Something was really wrong with Newt, and it was worrying me. He was the calmest person I knew, and if something was wrong, I wanted to know.

"What's bothering you?" I asked gently, my voice a bit hesitant as I was afraid he'd snap at me.

"Every lovin' thing in the universe," Newt replied with a sigh, staring off into space for a long while before continuing. "The girl from the Box. You know, the other one. Keeps groanin' and saying all kinds of weird stuff, but won't wake up. Med-jacks're doing their best to feed her, but she's eating less and less each time. I'm tellin' ya, something's bad about that whole bloody thing."

Clint and Jeff had told me about the talking in her sleep thing, and how they fed her, but they never said that she was starting to eat less. Though, I supposed, it wasn't my business and they didn't have to tell me.

I took another bite of my apple, the juice flooding my mouth. It suddenly didn't taste right, like it was sour.

Newt let out another long sigh and I turned my attention away from the apple and back to him, genuinely concerned. "Shuck it. But that's not what really has me buggin'."

"Then what is it?" Chuck asked eagerly, nearly bouncing in his seat. I couldn't tell if he really cared or if he just wanted more dirt to learn. Thomas leaned forward in curiosity.

"Alby and Minho," he mumbled. "They should've come back hours ago."

I creased my eyebrows in confusion. "Where'd they go?"

Newt looked up at me, surprised. His eyebrows shot up until they were hidden by his messy hair. "Nobody told you?"

I looked around. Chuck avoided my gaze. "Told me what?"

"Dylan," Thomas said slowly as if he was speaking to a toddler, "Minho and Alby went out into the Maze to look at the dead Griever."

gif is dylan and newt bein' cute

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a reader sent this to me because they thought it would go perfectly with this chapter and iM DYING (credit to the original artist, ofc!)

if that was a sucky ending and you know it, clap your hands! *everyone claps*

dedicated to @pointlesslauraa bc her comment on the character ask made my day :)

next chapter will be good im excited af frick yes!!!

~kristyn