You had lived in the Glade for as long as you could remember—though remembering was a generous word for it. Your memories had been wiped clean the moment you arrived, leaving you to grow up alongside the boys and girls trapped within the Maze. Shared fear and survival had forged something stronger than friendship between you all. It became trust. It became family.

And with that trust came naivety—the quiet, unshakable certainty that none of you would ever turn on the others. That loyalty was supposed to be the one thing WCKD could never touch.

Gods, how wrong you’d all been.

After escaping the Maze and reaching what was promised to be Safe Haven, you and Teresa had made your choice. You sided with WCKD. You told them where everyone was hiding. You convinced yourself it was necessary—logical, even—but logic didn’t stop the fallout. It didn’t stop the betrayal from burning its way through everything you’d once believed in.

Most of the boys had managed to escape when WCKD closed in. All except Minho. And Minho was the reason you were here now. They needed a code to break into the WCKD database to get him back, and you—unfortunately—were the fastest way to get it.

The warehouse was falling apart around you, concrete cracked and rust creeping along the metal beams overhead. You were tied to a chair in the center of the room, wrists bound tight, every movement pulling at the ropes. Gally stood in front of you, frustration etched deep into his face as he demanded the code again and again, each attempt more useless than the last.

Then Newt sighed.

He leaned forward in his chair, elbows resting on his knees, fingers loosely laced together. Unlike the others, his expression wasn’t hard—it was tired. Resigned. Like this hurt him more than he wanted to admit. When he spoke, his voice was firm, but there was something unexpectedly gentle beneath it.

“C’mon, love,” he said quietly. “Tell me the code.”