The Scorch Trials - James Dashner [108]
When they didn’t answer, he couldn’t help but take a peek. They were whispering to each other, stealing kisses between words. Something like burning oil filled his stomach.
He looked away again, focusing on the odd source of light in the back of the cave. A large rectangle of pale green, set into the dark stone, pulsed with an ethereal glow. It was as tall as an average man, maybe four feet wide. Stains streaked across its dull surface—a grimy window to something that looked like radioactive sludge, glowing and dangerous.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Teresa step away from Aris, their lovefest evidently over. He looked at her, wondering if his eyes showed just how much she had crushed him.
“Tom,” she said. “If it helps, I’m really sorry I hurt you. I did what I had to do back in the Maze, and being all buddy-buddy seemed like my best shot at getting the memories we needed to figure out that code and escape. And I didn’t have much choice here in the Scorch. All we had to do was get you here to pass the Trials. And it’s either you or us.”
Teresa paused for a second, and there was a strange glint in her eye. “Aris is my best friend, Tom,” she said calmly, evenly.
And that was what finally made Thomas crack. “I … don’t … care!” he screamed, though nothing could’ve been further from the truth.
“I’m just saying. If you care about me, then you should understand why I’d be willing to do whatever it takes to make it through this and keep him safe. Wouldn’t you have done the same for me?”
Thomas couldn’t believe how far away he felt from the girl he’d once thought was his best friend. Even in all of his memories—it was always the two of them. “What is this? Are you trying to come up with all the ways possible in the universe to hurt me? Just shut your shuck mouth and do whatever it is you brought me here to do!” His chest heaved with angry breaths, his heart thumping a deadly pace.
“Fine,” she replied. “Aris, let’s open the door. Time for Tom to go.”
CHAPTER 51
Thomas was done talking, to either of them. But he certainly wasn’t going down without a fight. He resolved to wait and watch for the best opportunity.
Aris kept his knife pointed at him as Teresa made her way toward the big rectangle of illuminated green glass. Thomas couldn’t deny his curiosity about the door.
She reached a point where the glow silhouetted her whole body. It made her edges fuzzy, as if she were dissolving. She walked across the cave until she’d left the light completely, then reached for the stone wall, started punching a finger on what had to be some sort of keypad that Thomas couldn’t see.
She finished up and stepped back toward him.
“We’ll see if that actually works,” Aris said.
“It will,” Teresa replied.
A loud pop sounded, followed by a sharp hiss. Thomas watched as the right edge of the glass began to swing outward like a door. As it opened, wispy streams of white mist swirled through the widening crack, almost immediately evaporating into nothing. It was like a long-abandoned freezer releasing its cold air into the heat of the night. Darkness lurked inside even as the rectangle of glass continued to emit its strange green radiance.
So the door wasn’t a window at all, Thomas thought. Just a green door. Maybe toxic waste wasn’t in his near future. He hoped.
The door finally stopped, thumping with an icy screech against the wall of jagged rock. A pit of black now lay where the door had once been—there wasn’t enough light to reveal what lay inside. The mist had completely stopped as well. Thomas felt an abyss of anxiety open up beneath him.
“Do you have a flashlight?” Aris asked.
Teresa put her spear on the ground, then pulled her backpack off and dug through its contents. A moment later she pulled out a flashlight and flicked it on.
Aris nodded back toward the opening. “Take a look while I watch him. Don’t try anything, Thomas. I’m pretty sure what they have planned for you