"ꜱᴄᴀʀ ᴛɪꜱꜱᴜᴇ ɪꜱ ꜱᴛʀᴏɴɢᴇʀ ᴛʜᴀɴ ʀᴇɢᴜʟᴀʀ ᴛɪꜱꜱᴜᴇ. ʀᴇᴀʟɪᴢᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ꜱᴛʀᴇɴɢᴛʜ, ᴍᴏᴠᴇ ᴏɴ." 

*Ria's POV*

The next morning I wake up early, walking out from my small hut the sunlight hits my face making me groan. "Ew" I mumble under my breath. 

Shielding my eyes I walk to the tables the boy built over the years. Benches line the sides of all the tables and most of the boys are there. When I walk under the overhang, most of the boys near me quite down. 

I would smile if I wasn't so hungover.

I take a seat next to Gally and Minho across from Newt and Alby. Newt quietly pushes a metal cup to me with water in it. 

"Wow, that bad huh?" Minho asks, and even though I'm not looking at him I can feel his smirk. I hold up a hand, staring down at my water as though maybe something will happen to it if I look away. 

"Come on Ri, take a sip" Gally says quietly with a nudge to my shoulder. Snapping out of it, I drink some of my water. The cold liquid feeling good. An attempt at soothing my stomach out of regurgitating last night's recipe. 

Thomas sits down with Chuck next to Alby a couple of minutes after I've finished my whole glass of water. 

"Imagine if we had to run the maze right now." Minho laughs as quietly as he can 

"That's why I always give the morning off, we'll all be working tonight with someone." I say

"So, where will I be with this afternoon?" Thomas asks his brown doe eyes only seeming to have gotten bigger. 

"You stick with Newt Greenie" I say, meeting his eyes. He doesn't look away, until he gets flustered. 

"The shank figured out his name" Minho says "Got a hit in on Gally too" He adds making Gally roll his eyes 

Surprised I look between Gally and the greenie, he flushes and Gally looks annoyed. 

"My name's Thomas." The greenie puts in quietly 

"Nice to meet you Thomas" I say, smiling slightly 

"Has anyone seen Ben or Dan?" Alby asks

"Bloody hell" Ria says, remembering something important "Before the bonfire last night I asked the both of them to head out in the morning, I had a suspicion and needed to check it out." I say

"Why didn't you run it past me?" Alby asks 

"I'm sorry I meant to and time got away with everything happening yesterday. I only had the chance to run it by Minho." Alby nods in understanding 

"It's alright Ri, big day yesterday hopefully today will be better." He says, "When do you think they'll be back or are they running the whole maze?" Alby asks

"They'll be back around mid-day or so." I say, and Alby nods

"Alright well, I'm going to go get some things from my hut. I'll be back in ten, make sure Fry saves me something" I say, walking away from the boys. 

*Thomas' POV*

When Ria walks away, the other boys look down at their plates. "What's your question Tommy?" Newt asks not even looking up from his food. 

Thomas pauses, both at the nickname and the fact that Newt knew he would have a question. "How come she's-"

"Hungover?" Minho finishes for me 

"Yeah." I say quietly. 

"Well ya shank, Gally's recipe is virtually harmless unless you drink a whole lot then it gets you and little hyped up so to speak." Alby explains 

"Why did she drink so much?" I ask "If she knows that she'll feel this bad now?" 

The boys look at each other, but Minho is the first to talk. "Two years ago yesterday we had this kid named Frank come up in the box. The kid right before Chuck. He challenged her to a fight, which she won within the rules. He almost killed her that night." He says quietly, re living the memory. "Frank was banished with all of the other instigators but she was out for weeks."

"Thought the she-shank was gonna die." Newt says, with a tiny humourless laugh  

"She almost did, but Jeff and Clint saved her life. Her shoulder has always been messed up from the nerve leading from her chest to shoulder got nicked." Gally says 

When I look at Chuck he seems astonished. I must not have been the only one to hear this story for the first time today. "So she wanted to forget?" I ask, not expecting an answer this time. I look out across the Glade where Ria is with a couple other boys. She points to something on the ground and then points away. They nod their heads, and she claps them on the shoulder. 

Her smile is almost as bright as her red hair in the sunlight. "Alright shanks" Newt says, my head whipping around at the sound of his voice. Minho's, Chucks, Gally's and Alby's do as well. We had all been watching her. "Time to get to work." Newt laughs

*Ria's POV*

Around mid-day I stop working with the builders, instead I try to find Minho. Hoping he'll be able to answer my question about the maze routes for tomorrow. I find him in the mapping hut, looking over paper after paper. 

"Hey, what's going on?" I ask him, snapping his eyes away from the papers they land on me. 

"Nothing, I'm just-" He says flustered. A way I haven't seen him since when he came up all those years ago. 

"Minho, tell me what's going on." I say walking over to him. 

"Ria, I don't know if there really is a way out. Ben and Dan went to go check on the section that was supposed to be open today, I don't think that will do anything though. We've been in all the sections and looked through each of them. There's nothing there. Maybe we've had this all wrong from the start" He says slightly panicked

"Minho," I say gently grabbing his shoulder and turning him towards me. "Alby and I, we didn't give you this job because you worry or because you don't have hope. In fact this job is the one that I knew you would have. You've always been determined to get out of here, to leave and to take everyone with you."

He looks down at me, a sad look on his face "Maybe I'm not cut out for it anymore." He says 

"I refuse to believe that Minho, you are the only one I trust for this position. If there weren't any downs in a medium life then the good things that happen wouldn't be good things. They'd just be things. Fight Minho. Fight that voice, and survive. We need you." I tell him gently, squeezing his hand once as he nods slightly.  

Exiting the hut I walk back through the woods, we'll worry about the maze routes later. 

When I walk into the Glade though, a limping and exhausted looking Newt is the first one to find me. "Ria, come with me." 

"Okay" I say walking with him as fast as he can go "What's goin' on Newt?" I ask, worried as we get closer to the med jack hut

"Ben came back" Newt says "Dan didn't."

"Oh my god, so Dan's-"

"As far as we know yeah" Newt says 

"Is Ben hurt?!" I ask picking up my pace just a little, thankfully Newt is able to keep up. 

"He's been stung Ria" Newt says as we walk into the hut. Thomas sits on one of the tables. Clint bandaging his wrist. "He attacked Thomas in the woods today." He says. Thomas and Clint looking up at us as we get closer. 

"Are you alright Thomas?" I ask gently

"Yeah, I'm fine." He says, rubbing his wrist gently once Clint is finished. 

"It should heal soon" Clint puts in

"Good," I say coming to stand in front of Thomas "What happened?"

So, Thomas goes back to what happened. Going into the forest, seeing Ben and running from him. Ben held him down so hard he heard a crack from his wrist. That's when he ran out of the woods and the rest of the boys helped him. 

I nod slowly, trying to take in everything he's said. "Okay, Newt?"

Newt comes a little closer when I say his name. "Get me Alby and tell him to meet me over by the Pens."

"Do you want me to get Minho too?" He asks 

"No, he's got a lot going on right now."  I say, Newt and I leaving the hut. Heading two seperate ways. I walk to the pit, where Ben sits on the ground. As soon as he sees me though he begins to scream. He rattles the bars with his hands. 

"It's bad Ria" Alby's voice says from behind me 

"Yeah" I whisper "What do we do?" I ask 

"We see if he makes any progress." Alby says "If he doesn't then we'll have to-" 

"Stop" I say "I don't- I don't want to hear it right now. We'll wait for him to get better, and then if he doesn't we'll deal with that then." I tell him

"Alright" He says "How long do you want to wait?" 

I want to say days, but knowing that if he is really going to get better it's going to be by tonight. Any longer and it'll just get worse. "Tonight" I manage to say "If by sun down he hasn't shown any progress then we'll do what we have to." 

Alby nods "Let's go talk with Thomas, I asked him what happened but I feel like there has to be more. Why would Ben go for the new Greenie, he wouldn't even have anything on him yet." 

Alby and I talk to Thomas, hearing not much else from him that we haven't heard before we move on. Alby heads to the hut as I check in on Ben before following him. The rest of the day carries on like this. Checking on Ben, talking about it, checking on Ben, feeling helpless. 

Finally, the sun begins to lower and soon the walls will close. "Ria...you know what we have to do. He's not getting better, and he attacked a Glader." 

"I know Alby" I say hugging my knees to my chest, wanting nothing more than to sink into the hut walls

"It's time Ria, we don't have a choice. Waiting won't make him better, it only gets worse you know that." 

"I know Alby" I say tiredly. I stand, testing out my feet feeling as though they may fail underneath me. "Go tell Minho, he knows what to do. Tell the other boys and hand out the poles" 

"What are you going to do?" Alby asks 

"To tell Ben goodbye." I say, walking out the door. My boots hitting the ground heavily as I go. 

When I look back I see Alby walking quickly across the Glade to the already waiting group of boys by the hammocks. I turn back around, walking the rest of the way to Ben. 

"Ben?" I say, looking in 

"Help me" He whispers

"I am" I choke out, opening the door. "Come on" I whisper, offering him my hand. 

Gentler than I thought he would, he takes it. Lifting himself out of the pit he looks around. His face is delirious for a moment and then he begins to clutch his head. Groaning he doubles over. "Help me" he whispers. 

Tears come to my eyes, losing himself he begins to shout again. In a hurry I pull him up from his doubled over position. I cling to him in a hug as though my life is dependent on it. He stops wiggling, his body going slack before his arms slowly wrap around me. 

"I'm so sorry Ben." I whisper leaning up to his ear "Please, god," I sob out "forgive me"

"For what?" He asks in a voice weaker than I've ever heard come from him.

"Goodbye" I say. As soon as the words are out of my mouth I spin him around tying his hands tightly and then looping it over his neck. He struggles. 

"What? Ria, what?" Suddenly the realization dawns on him "No, no, no" He whimpers, his bottom lip beginning to quiver. 

I clench my jaw, steering him towards the doors. He struggles the whole way, whimpers and pleads are the only things that leave his mouth. 

"I'm so sorry Ben." I apologize again quietly as we get closer to the door

*3rd person POV*

Ria walks with the struggling boy into the middle of the semi circle created by the other Gladers around them. 

Minho comes over into the middle, cutting the ties around his neck. He doesn't look at either of them when he throws the bag into the maze where it comes to a rolling stop a few feet away. Beyond the boundary of safety. 

"No, no, no" Ben whimpers and the doors begin to grind. Singling to the Glade that the walls will be closed soon. "You said you would help me!" Ben screams furiously, taking a few quick and stumbling steps towards her. 

"Poles!" Ria screams into the air, seemingly to no one but the boys behind her raise their poles. The ones on the side steady the spears in their shaking hands. "Move forward" She shouts her sad voice filling the air once more. 

The boys from behind her pass her, their poles pushing Ben further and further past the walls until he has no choice but stay on the other side. He whimpers as the doors slide shut, and an early quiet falls over the Glade. 

A tear falls slowly down Ria's face, but as quickly as it came she wipes it away. Turning towards the boys she sets her jaw. 

"He was a brother" She says with a convicted quietness "And that will never change for us, but he did. Not because he wanted to, but because the people who put him in this damn maze are what brought his demise." She says, meeting each boys eyes. When she does they all look down, as though she has berated them and then murdered their puppy. 

"Get some sleep boys" She whispers, her hair whipping in the wind as she stares back at the walls that had closed only moments before. 

"Ria?" Minho asks from behind her, tearing her eyes away from the doors she turns toward him. Alby stands close to Minho, both of them looking at her with concern. "Will you be okay?" Alby asks 

"Tomorrow," She begins "I'm going to go find Ben and bring his body back. It's the least he deserves after I got him killed." 

"You got him killed?" Alby repeats, an eyebrow raising 

"I sent him out there, and didn't even run it by you. It's my responsibility and I won't get anyone else killed in the process." 

"Too bad" Alby says, "I've always stood next to you, and I won't stop doing that now. We lead together."

"I'm the head of the runners, Ben was someone I was supposed to protect and I agreed with you and let them go without someone like you or me Ria." Minho says "There's no way in hell I'm making the same mistake again." 

"Forget the past with Frank Ria" Alby says "Forget it, because no one will rise against you again. Not because you scare them into submission but because you are their leader. They trust that you're doing the right thing. You've ever trusted the same again since Frank, so start now. Trust, now." Alby says concretely "Because we trust you." 

Ria nods her head slowly, agreeing hesitantly. 

"Now or never I suppose. Now or never." 

𝟚,𝟞𝟛𝟘 𝕨𝕠𝕣𝕕𝕤