"How much longer Dr?" I asked.

It only took me about 10 minutes to explain in short the terrible situation we were in. Jorge, Vince, Magnus and Jasmine went to get the Burg ready. I stayed behind, bouncing on my toes or pacing back and forth.

"About two more minutes. I know it's hard to be patient, my child. But in this situation I cannot make any mistakes." He said gently as he placed the serum into the last mixing machine.

"I know. Just... anxious."

"Understandable." He gave me a smile over his shoulder.

I ran a hand over my wild hair. The wet hair had dried and turned into curls around my face. My clothes had mostly dried. I paced up and down the hall, waiting. With a huge sigh I shoved my hands into my pockets and leaned against the wall. My hand felt something damp and crumpled in my pocket. Confused I pulled it out.

The note.

I'd completely forgotten about it. Newt had said I would know when the time came to read it. And I should’ve done it after he left me on the stairs, I should have read it right then and there. If the time hadn’t been right then, when would it have ever been?

I gently in folded it, peeling the envelope open, it was still slightly damp from our jump into the pool. Gingerly I pulled out the small slip of paper. The harsh lights of the hall glared down and made the two short sentences hard to read.

Kill me. If you’ve ever been my friend, kill me.

I read it over and over, wishing the words would change. To think that Newt, my friend had been so scared that he’d had the foresight to write those words made me sick to my stomach. I remembered how angry Newt had been at me specifically when he swung the launcher in my face  Newt didn't want to become a Crank, no matter how much he said he was okay.

I shook my head violently, and slid down the wall, my head in my hands.

He's not a full crank, he's still there just enough to be screaming on the inside, deranged and suffering every shuck second of it. Tormented like a human buried alive. I needed that serum and I needed it now. I stood up and wiped the tears from my cheeks and marched with a new urgency and determination into the lab.

"Dr Hans-"

"Ready. Here you are dear. Two full ready to administer syringes. Just stab and push the button at the top." Hans cut me off and held out two full pre-filled syringes with a dark red serum inside. "It won't work instantly. So...if he's as gone as you say, you might have to sedate him. In which case, I have made these." He handed me a clear syringe.

The door opened behind us, I twisted around, Sarg came limping towards us.

"Sarg? What's going on?"

"Laurence is off his rocker! He's gone full crank! He hasn't been taking the serum. He's destroying the whole city! That wasn't the plan!"

"Ya we noticed. The entire city has gone to shuck! Also cranks are crawling the streets!"

"Ya, apparently he teamed up with Crank City... somehow. But we needed to leave. Asap!"

"No. Not yet. Our guys are still in the city, and WICKED has been rounding up immunes to restart the Maze Trials."

Sarg cursed.

"Well, if you help me pack up, and anyone else who escaped, help me pack up the lab and we will start our journey to The Right Arm." Dr Hans suggested.

"At this point, whatever." Sarg threw his hands I to the air.

"I've talked to Vince."

"Talked to me about what?" He asked walking back into the lab with Magnus behind him.

"Going with you back to the Right Arm and then Safehaven."

Vince nodded.

"Vince, this is Sargent Wildler, he's incharge of the Residence, well him and Magnus now." I said giving a quick introduction.

They shook hands.

"Well I gotta go. Where's Magnus?" I asked.

"Downstairs with Jorge and and Jasmine, tell them I'll stay help pack up and meet you at the Right Arm with your Doctor." He nodded at me.

"Good that." I turned to Dr Hans, "thank you!" I gave him a quick hug when he returned awkwardly and patted the top of my head. I spun on my heel and sprinted down the hall to Magnus and Jorge. 

______________________

"Brenda? Zee? Fry?" I called into the coms again.

There was fuzz and static.

"Zee?" I yelled, "Brenda? Frypan?"

"Charlie?" The static was thick, but I heard Brenda.

"Bee? Come on! Come on! You there?"

"Yeah! Yeah I'm here!"

"Oh thank shuck!"

"What the hells going on?"

"Long story. Jorge and Mangus are back, we have the burge were coming to you. Be ready!"

"Copy!"

It only took us 5 minutes to get over the wall and over to our second Resistance building. Brenda, Zyan and Fry had got the immune kids we busted out, safely there. They were waiting for us, the fighting was getting closer. More buildings were on fire and more cranks swarmed the city.

I waited anxiously. Not being able to sit still, I paced up and down. My hand gripped the syringes tightly in my pocket.

"Clear the door!" Jorge called.

The Berg ramp lowered and I ran down even before the door was fully open, sprinting down and jumping off.

"Brenda? Zee? Fry?" I screamed, sprinting into the building.

I slammed into someone, they caught me as I fell backwards.

"FRYPAN!" I leapt into his arms.

"Good to see you too!" He chuckled.

"We need to hurry, get those kids on bored." I panted. My panic was close to hysteria. I still needed to find Minho and Sophie, Newt and Thomas and Gally were still MIA inside a burning crumbling WICKED with a whole bunch of immune civilians.

My pocket buzzed. I scrambled to a hault and pulled the com out.

"Tiger?"

"Min! What? What's going on?"

"We found him."

"On my way." I turned to Fry, he just nodded in understanding.

"Go get him back." He said, "Brenda and Zyan and I will get them in bored and we'll come find you."

"Where are you going?" Magnus came striding down the ramp, Jasmine beside him.

"Sophie and Min found Newt. I'm off." I said in a hurry as I turned away.

"I'm coming." He stated. He turned and kissed Jasmine quickly.

"Keep up big guy." I bounced twice on my feet and took off.

"Min? What's location?" I yelled into the com.

Radio silence. Panic bubbled inside of me.

"MINHO!" I screamed into the coms.

"Corner of 1st and Main." Sophie yelled, there was an explosion that came through the coms.

"Shit." Sophie yelled.

Magnus and I glanced at each other, put our heads down and we sprinted. It took us longer than I hoped. We had to avoid crumbling buildings, exploding cars, gangs of cranks and wild crazed civilians and WICKED guards.

"This world is shucked." Magnus screamed as he tackled me out of the way of a car that exploded. His body flattened over mine. He got up and pulled me to my feet, and pushing me down the street in front of him.

We continued to run. There was a wild scream from beside us. I ducked on  instinct. Something flew over me, landing with a thud. I turned towards what had tried to tackle me. It was a wild crank. Magnus was right beside me. The crank turned. I let out a sigh of relief. It wasn't Newt. But then it would have been easier to grab him.

The crank screamed, his eyes wild and black, well his one eye, the other was missing, and looked like he lost it recently. Blood flowed from his eye socket. He was missing chunks of hair, he was covered in cuts and blood. And black goo dribbled from his chin.

"You have pretty eyes. I want your eyes. I could look at pretty eyes all day..." He was cooing like he was talking to a lover, it made me shiver.

"GIVE ME YOUR EYES!" he screamed suddenly and jumped at me.

I slammed my elbow into his face, making his scream in pain again, as his nose broke. I ducked under his wild grab. I twisted to try get my foot into his stomach, but he was lifted off the ground. Magnus had grabbed him. A wild fierce almost feral look on his face. The crank twisted and tried to get to Magnus now, in a swift motion Magnus snapped his neck. He stopped mid scream and flopped to the ground. I stood frozen for a second.

"Well I'm glad your on my team."

Magnus nodded, panting hard.

"You okay?" I asked cautiously.

He nodded. "Yeah. Yeah I'm fine. Sorry."

"Don't be sorry."

"Feeling a little protective."

"It's appreciated." I smiled at him, "come on, we're almost there."

We turned and continued running.

A building exploded, causing metal and glass debre to fly everywhere. I threw my hands up as we dove behind a flipped car. But I wasn't fast enough. I felt sharp stinging pain all over my arms and hands and face.

Lifting my head, I saw cuts all over the place. And bright red speckled my body from shards of glass stuck in my skin. With the panic and adrenaline in my system I didn't feel it. I got up and continued to run. Magnus right behind me.

We took a turn and I slammed into something.

"What the shuck?"

"Shuck hell!"

"Minho?"

"Tiger?"

"Minho!"

"Magnus?"

"What the shucks going on?"

"How many times are you going to slam into me?"

"That sounded so wrong! Don't worry I won't tell Gally!" Minho laughed.

I rolled my eyes. Magnus and I bent over, hands on knees sucking air. Sophie and Minho looked a little worse for wear, but looked alright.

"So what's going on?" I asked, "where's Newt?"

"Uhh well, a building exploded we had to duck and hide and lost sight of him. He's with a group that don't look too gone, but still."

"Shuck." I muttered.

All our coms went off. Magnus was the faster one and pulled his out.

"Anyone there?" Gally's frantic voice crackled through the coms.

"Yeah! Here! What's up?"

"We got the munnies. We need help!"

"We're coming, where are you?"

"Back door of WICKED."

"Hold on."

"Doing our best!"

Newt would have to wait. There was no time to sit and cry. No extra space available to worry about it, right now. Stiffling a sob and shoving that awful thought to the back I followed Magnus and the others.

Trying to run through explosions and fun fire was providing to be difficult. The fighting was more deadly. The smoke was thicker, it was hard to see where the line of who's side anyone was on. It looked like everyone was fighting anyone. It meant that we were mostly left alone. But not entirely. I pulled Sophie away and shoved her into the middle. Magnus plowed a way in the front, Minho and I on either side of Sophie, trying to keep her away from cranks.

Running, dodging and jumping over things, it took us longer then it should have to get to the back door of WICKED.

Magnus in his hurry just about ripped the door off. All the electricity had stopped working, so the scanners and skidding doors were useless now, which worked in our favour.

"Carful! This building doesn't look stable" I yelled.

"Yes, clearly. Those explosions would do that." Minho said dryly.

"Haha your fun." I rolled my eyes.

"Gally, were at the back door, where the hell are you?" Magnus yelled into the coms, inside the building was dark, a few lights flickered, wires sparked. Smoke from random fires billowed from open doors. It was errily empty.

"Still in the basement!" Came a crackling voice.

"Stay there. We're coming!"

Magnus headed for the stairs, the rest of us following. It didn't take us long, the basement had narrow halls but it was straight forward to get to, the loud noise of the crowd was easy to follow.

Two boys stood in the hall waiting. I sprinted past Magnus and launched into Gally's waiting arms.

"See, just a see ya later." I mumbled into his neck, which I had squished my face into.

I felt him exhale in relief again.

"Not letting you out if my sight again."

Minho stepped up to them. "All right, happy time is over. How in the world are we going to do this, dude?"

"It shouldn’t be too bad," Thomas said.

I let go of Gally and looked into the  huge basement room. With a sinking feeling in my gut I saw how many people were actually here. And now I hated the idea of actually trying to funnel all these people not only through the halls of WICKED, but through the streets of a burning city. Still, it had to be done.

"Don’t feed me that klunk," Minho snapped at Thomas, "Your eyes don’t lie."

"You gazing into his eyes now?" I elbowed him.

He yelped and swatted my arm away.

Thomas smiled a tight lipped smile. "Well, we’ve certainly got a lot of people to fight with us."

"Have you looked at these poor saps?" Minho asked, sounding disgusted. "Half of ’em are younger than us, and the other half look like they haven’t so much as arm wrestled before, much less had a fistfight.

"Sometimes numbers are all that matters," Thomas responded.

"So...what's the plan?" Minho asked again.

"Okay, Magnus, you know the way back. We'll just have to lead them all back, as best we can, to the Resistance building, and transport them in groups from there to The Right Arm in the burg."

"Not much of a plan." Minho grumbled.

"Well...when do any of our plans actually work out?" Gally rolled his eyes.

"Very true." I nodded.

"Here goes nothing."

"Hey! You guys need some help?"

We spun around and saw Brenda, Fry, Zyan and Jasmine were running towards us down the hall.

"What? How...?" Thomas stuttered.

"You're coms, idiot." Brenda rolled her eyes. "Everyone can hear you, it's all the same channel. The kids are all safe and Jorge is bringing them to the Right Arm, he'll be back in twenty minutes and will bring a second Berg with Vince."

"Great!"

"Well the more help, the better."

"All right, lest do this!" Minho said clapping his hands together and rubbing them.