Free The Death Cure by James Dashner Page A

whole escape so far might be nothing but an orchestrated exercise—was looking more and more likely. They’d been reduced once again to mice, scuttling about in a different kind of maze. Thomas hoped so badly that it wasn’t true.
    Newt had already wandered into the weapons room. “Look at this,” he called.
    When Thomas entered the room Newt was pointing to a section of empty wall space and shelves. “Look at the dust patterns. It’s pretty obvious that a bunch of stuff was taken recently. Maybe even within the last hour or so.”
    Thomas inspected the area. The room was pretty dusty—enough to make you sneeze if you moved around too much—but the spots Newt pointed out were completely clean. He was dead on.
    “Why is that so important?” Minho asked from behind them.
    Newt turned on him. “Can’t you figure something out yourself for once, you bloody shank!”
    Minho winced. He looked more shocked than angry.
    “Whoa, Newt,” Thomas said. “Things suck, yeah, but slim it. What’s wrong?”
    “I’ll tell ya what’s bloody wrong. You go all tough-guy without a plan, leading us around like a bunch of chickens lookin’ for feed. And Minho can’t take a bloody step without askin’ which foot he should use.”
    Minho had finally recovered enough to get ticked. “Look, shuck-face. You’re the one acting like a genius because you figured out some guards took weapons from the
weapons
room. I thought I’d give you the benefit of the doubt, act like maybe you’d discovered something deeper than that. Next time I’ll pat you on the freaking back for stating the obvious.”
    Thomas looked back at Newt in time to see his friend’s expression change. He seemed stricken, almost teary.
    “I’m sorry,” Newt murmured, then turned and walked out of the room.
    “What was
that
?” Minho whispered.
    Thomas didn’t want to say what he was thinking: that Newt’s sanity was slowly being eaten away. And luckily he didn’t have to—Brenda spoke up. “You guys
were
missing his point.”
    “Which was?” Minho asked.
    “There had to have been two or three dozen guns and Launchers in this section, and now they’re all gone. Very recently. In the last hour or so, like Newt said.”
    “Yeah?” Minho prodded, just as it clicked for Thomas.
    Brenda held her hands out as though the answer should be obvious. “Guards only come here when they need a replacement or want to use something besides a Launcher. Why would they
all
need to do that at the same time?
Today?
And Launchers are so heavy, you can’t fire them if you’re carrying another weapon, too. Where are the weapons they would have left behind?”

CHAPTER 15
     
    Minho was the first to offer an explanation. “Maybe they knew something like this might happen, and they didn’t want to kill us. From the looks of it, unless you get it right in the head, those Launcher things just stun you for a while. So they all came and got those to use with their regular guns.”
    Brenda was shaking her head before he even finished. “No. It’s standard for them to carry Launchers at all times—so it doesn’t make sense that they’d all come at once to get a new one. Whatever you think about WICKED, it’s not their goal to kill as many people as possible. Even when Cranks break in.”
    “Cranks have
broken in
here before?” Thomas asked.
    Brenda nodded. “The more infected there are, the more past the Gone, the more desperate they get. I really doubt the guards—”
    Minho interrupted her. “Maybe
that’s
what happened. With all those alarms going off, maybe some Cranks broke in and took whatever weapons were here, stunned people, then started eatin’ their shuck bodies. Maybe we’ve only seen a few guards because the rest of ’em are dead!”
    Thomas had seen Cranks past the Gone, and the memories haunted him. Cranks who had lived with the Flare infection so long that it had eaten away at their brains until they were completely insane. Almost like animals