The Death Cure

“Keep them coming and get them ready,” he told Brenda; then he sprinted for the door. If Chancellor Paige had lied about the Flat Trans, or if someone from WICKED or the Right Arm figured out what they were doing, they were finished.

The door led to a small room filled with tables that were littered with tools and scraps of metal and machine parts. On the far side, a large piece of canvas had been hung against the wall. Thomas ran to it and ripped it down. Behind it he found a dully shimmering wall of gray framed by a rectangle of shiny silver, and next to it, a control box.

It was the Flat Trans.

The chancellor had told the truth.

Thomas let out a laugh at the thought. WICKED—the leader of WICKED—had helped him.

Unless … He realized he needed to know one last thing. He had to test it to see where it led before he sent everyone through. Thomas sucked in a deep breath. This was it.

He forced himself to step through the icy Flat Trans surface. And he came out into a simple wooden shed, its door wide open in front of him. Beyond that he saw … green. Lots and lots of green. Grass, trees, flowers, bushes. It was good enough for him.

He stepped back through to the maintenance room, exhilarated. They’d done it—they were almost safe. He ran out to the storage area.

“Come on!” he yelled. “Get everyone in here—it works! Hurry!”

An explosion rattled the walls and the metal racks. Dust and debris rained down from the ceiling.

“Hurry!” he repeated.

Teresa already had people ru

“You know what this is, right?” he asked her.

She nodded, bravely trying to hide her eagerness to get through the thing and out of there. “I’ve been around the block a few times, kid.”

“Can I trust you to stand here and make sure everyone goes through?”

She blanched at first, but then she nodded.

“Don’t worry,” Thomas assured her. “Just stay here as long as you can.”

As soon as she agreed he ran back to the door.

Others had packed the small room, and Thomas stepped back. “It’s right through there. Make space on the other side!”

He squeezed his way past the knot of people and back into the warehouse. Everyone had lined up and was filing into the maintenance room. And standing at the back of the crowd were Minho, Brenda, Jorge, Teresa, Aris, Frypan and a few members of Group B. Gally was there, too. Thomas weaved his way to his friends.

“They better be quick about it up there,” Minho said. “The explosions are getting closer and closer.”

“The whole place is go

Thomas sca

“Well, what do we have here?” a voice shouted from the back of the room.

A few gasps sounded around Thomas as he turned to see who’d spoken. The Rat Man had just come through the door from the outside hallway, and he wasn’t alone. He was surrounded by WICKED security guards. Thomas counted seven total, which meant that he and his friends still had the advantage.

Janson stopped and cupped his hands to shout over the rumble of another explosion. “Strange place to hide out when everything’s about to come down!” Pieces of metal fell from the ceiling, clattering to the ground.

“You know what’s here!” Thomas shouted back. “It’s too late—we’re already going!”

Janson pulled out the same long knife he had outside and flashed it. And as if on cue, the others revealed similar weapons.

“But we can salvage a few,” Janson said. “And it looks like we have the strongest and brightest right here in front of us. Even our Final Candidate, no less! The one we need most, yet who refuses to cooperate.”

Thomas and his friends had spread out in a line between the dwindling crowd of prisoners and the guards. The others in Thomas’s group were searching the floor for anything they could find to use as a weapon—pipes, long screws, the jagged edge of a metal grid. Thomas spotted a warped piece of thick cabling that ended in a spike of rigid wires, as deadly-looking as a spear. He grabbed it just as another explosion rocked the room, sending a huge section of the metal shelving crashing to the floor

“I’ve never seen such a menacing bunch of thugs!” the Rat Man yelled, but his face was crazed, his mouth contorted into a wild sneer. “I have to admit I’m terrified!”

“Just shut your shuck mouth and let’s get this over with!” Minho shouted back at him.

Janson focused his cold, mad gaze on the teenagers facing him.

“Gladly,” he said.

Thomas ached to lash out for all the fear and pain and suffering that had defined his life for so long. “Go!” he shouted.

The two groups charged each other, their yells of battle drowned out by the sudden concussion of detonating explosives that shook the building around them.

CHAPTER 72

Somehow Thomas kept his balance, despite the entire room quaking from the closest series of explosions yet. Most of the racks collapsed, and objects were launched across the room. He dodged a jagged chunk of wood, then jumped over a round piece of machinery that spun past him.

Gally, who was at Thomas’s side, tripped and fell; Thomas helped him up. They continued charging. Brenda slipped but caught her balance.

They crashed into the others like the first line of soldiers in an ancient foot battle. Thomas met the Rat Man himself, who was at least half a foot taller than him, wielding his blade; it came down in an arc toward Thomas’s shoulder, but Thomas thrust upward with his stiff cable and co

To his right and left, everyone was fighting. Thomas’s head was full of the sounds of metal against metal, screams and shouts and grunts. Some had matched up two-on-one; Minho ended up fighting a woman who seemed twice as strong as any of the men. Brenda was on the ground, wrestling a ski

“I don’t care if I bleed to death,” Janson said with a grimace. “As long as I die after I get you back up there.”

Another explosion jolted the floor beneath him and Thomas stumbled forward, dropping his scavenged weapon and slamming into Janson’s chest. They both crashed to the ground, and Thomas struggled to push off the man with one hand while swinging as hard as he could with the other. He smashed Janson’s left cheek with his balled fist and watched as the Rat Man’s head snapped to the side, blood spraying from his mouth. Thomas reached back to swing again, but the man arched his body violently, throwing him off; he landed on his back.

Before he could move Janson had jumped on top of him and gotten his legs wrapped around his torso, pi

He only rose a few inches off the ground, but it was enough to free his arms from the man’s knees. He blocked the next punch with both of his forearms, then threw both fists up and at Janson’s face, co