The Death Cure Read Online Free PDF Page B

luring him to the chamber in the mountains and forcing him inside.
    “I’ll go ask him,” Teresa said.
    Thomas and his friends watched as she walked over, and she and her group started whispering furiously to each other.
    “I
hate
that chick,” Minho finally said.
    “Come on, she’s not so bad,” Frypan offered.
    Minho rolled his eyes. “If she’s doing it, I’m not.”
    “Me neither,” Newt agreed. “And I’m the one who supposedly has the bloody Flare, so I have more stake in it than anybody. But I’m not falling for one more trick.”
    Thomas had already settled on that. “Let’s just hear what she says. Here she comes.”
    Her talk with Aris had been short. “He sounded even more sure than us. They’re all for it.”
    “Well, that settles it for me,” Minho answered. “If Aris and Teresa are for it, I’m against it.”
    Thomas couldn’t have said it better himself. Every instinct he had told him Minho was right, but he didn’t voice his opinion aloud. He watched Teresa’s face instead. She turned and looked at Thomas. It was a look he knew so well—she expected him to side with her. But the difference was that now he was suspicious about why she wanted it so badly.
    He stared at her, forcing his own expression to remain blank—and Teresa’s face fell.
    “Suit yourselves.” She shook her head, then turned and walked away.
    Despite everything that had happened, Thomas’s heart lurched in his chest as she retreated across the room.
    “Ah, man,” Frypan’s voice cut in, jarring Thomas back. “We can’t let them put those things on our face, can we? I’d just be happy back in my kitchen in the Homestead, I swear I would.”
    “You forget about the Grievers?” Newt asked.
    Frypan paused a second, then said, “They never messed with me in the kitchen, now, did they?”
    “Yeah, well, we’ll just have to find you a new place to cook.” Newt grabbed Thomas and Minho by the arms and led them away from the group. “I’ve heard enough bloody arguments. I’m not getting on one of those beds.”
    Minho reached over and squeezed Newt’s shoulder. “Me neither.”
    “Same here,” Thomas said. Then he finally voiced what had been building inside him for weeks. “We’ll stick around, play along and act nice,” he whispered. “But as soon as we get a chance, we’re going to fight our way out of this place.”

CHAPTER 7
     
    Rat Man returned before Newt or Minho could respond. But judging by the looks on their faces, Thomas was sure they were on board. One hundred percent.
    More people were piling into the room, and Thomas turned his attention to what was going on. Everyone who’d joined them was dressed in a one-piece, somewhat loose-fitting green suit with WICKED written across the chest. It struck Thomas suddenly how thoroughly every detail of this game—this
experiment
—had been thought out. Could it be that the very name they’d used for their organization had been one of the Variables from the beginning? A word with obvious menace, yet an entity they were told was good? It was probably just another poke to see how their brains reacted, what they felt.
    It was all a guessing game. Had been from the very beginning.
    Each doctor—Thomas assumed they were doctors, like Rat Man had said—took a place next to one of the beds. They fidgeted with the masks that hung from the ceiling, adjusting the tubes, tinkering with knobs and switches Thomas couldn’t see.
    “We’ve already assigned each of you a bed,” Rat Man said, looking down at papers on a clipboard he’d brought back with him. “Those staying in this room are …” He rattled off a few names, including Sonya and Aris, but not Thomas or any of the Gladers. “If I didn’t call your name, please follow me.”
    The whole situation had taken on a bizarre taint, too casual andrun-of-the-mill for the seriousness of what was going on. Like gangsters yelling out roll call before they slaughtered a group of weeping