At WICKED Headquarters

"Janson!"

A thin man entered the room with an annoyed look on his face. His cold eyes flicked around the space, inspecting the array of monitors and computers until a woman wearing a white lab coat rushed up to him, waving frantically at one of the monitors facing them. The woman quickly walked over and bent down over the screen, quickly typing something on the keyboard. A small beeping sound, then a white wall lit up with the screen of the monitor.

"What is it, Dr. Cooper?" The man, Janson, stared warily at the projection as the woman jabbed her finger at the range of data.

"Janson, listen to me! Subject B6 isn't responding to the chip implant in his brain or the commands we're sending him! Do you know what that means, Janson?" Not bothering to wait for an answer, the woman continued. "That means he will be able to remember. Remember, Janson! The Trials will fall apart!"

Janson's disinterested expression instantly vanished and was replaced with worry. He put a finger on the wall, tracing the feed the computer had spit out according to Subject B6's brain.

"And that's not even the worst of it! He told the rest of Group B about Rachel, Thomas, and Teresa! We did the best we could with the Swipe, but certain triggers could bring back the memories!" Dr. Cooper's voice had gotten louder and louder in volume until she was almost shouting. Janson rubbed his temples and sat down in one of the swivel chairs positioned next to the desks.

"Why not just go through the Swipe again?"

"AGAIN??" This time, Dr. Cooper really was shouting. "Janson, do you have any idea how much those cost? And it would be about ten times more expensive and harder to do remotely! For the love of God, you're supposed to be in charge of this project! How could you not know that?"

Janson mumbled something incoherent and said, "Then fix it."

Dr. Cooper laughed humorlessly. "What do you think I've been trying to do? Tossing glitter in the air and celebrating? We can only guarantee one more order to her, then the chip might even become useless. Any ideas?"

Sighing, Janson stared at the data projected onto the wall and tapped his fingers on the arm of the chair. He rolled himself closer and closed his eyes, thinking hard.

"Make him do something crazy," he said slowly. "So insane that she'll be Banished. Then you can let the Grievers do their job."

Dr. Cooper stared at Janson, stunned. "What do you mean?" she demanded, anger becoming more apparent than ever. "You want me to kill him indirectly? That's just as bad as killing him directly! Why don't we just do that?" Her voice was heavy with venomous sarcasm, but Janson answered anyway.

"Group B will ask questions," he said in a tired voice. "They might get curious if he just drops dead. It'll look more plausible if he gets killed by the Grievers."

Dr. Cooper clenched her teeth, but she knew she couldn't do anything. "Fine," she said bitterly, starting to move toward the computers. "Of course, Director Janson."

Janson shook his head slowly, more out of disbelief than anything else. He left the room.

Now the room was completely silent aside from the humming of computers. Dr. Cooper waited for a moment, then quickly typed a string into the computer connected with Subject B6. The command would certainly get the young boy banished, just like Janson wanted. But it would also most likely make the subject do a few things that would work in her favor. Not Janson's, and certainly not WICKED's. No, Dr. Cooper had other plans for the boy.

Dr. Cooper read over the line once, twice, three times before she was satisfied that the wording was as precise as she could get it. Then she spun the time stamp to Day 740 and 12:30 PM so that would be when the order would start to affect him.

She had been studying B6's brain patterns for almost three years and knew her almost as well as B6 knew herself, maybe even more if you count the Swipe. Checking over the words one last time, she hit the enter key.

At the Glade

"Neil. . . Neil, can you hear me?"

I groaned and opened my eyes. My vision was blurry, but I could make out a figure of a girl with hair dark as ink and blue eyes that stared intently down at me.

"Wha -" I rolled over and vomited my guts out. When my throat stopped burning from the acid, I forced myself to look up at the girl again.

She seemed familiar, like I had seen her before. The girl studied me closely and asked me, "Do you remember anything?" I shook my head, feeling sick and managed to say, "Who are you?"

The girl shook her head, a sad smile playing on her lips. "You'll meet me soon enough, I think, if I can get hold of the Control Room fast enough. I'm not important right now, though. What you need to remember is that this is all for a reason, alright? And everything. . . everything is going to change."

I woke up with a gasp, gulping down air like I had been starved of it. For a moment, I didn't register my surroundings and my mind tried to process where I was. Then I remembered I had switched beds with Marie and told myself to relax. I was in the Glade. it was going to be alright.

Suddenly, a loud booming echoed through the Glade, making everyone who had been sleeping immediately jerk up in surprise. All around me, there were tired girls rubbing their eyes and stretching in their sleeping bags. Most of them hadn't realized what the sound meant, but I did and watched as one by one, realization dawned and their mouths formed into comical "o"s.

I turned my attention toward the Homestead, where Harriet was sprinting out and heading toward me. Fully awake now, I put an arm over my crutch which I had gotten used to and walked as quickly as I could toward her.

As the booming faded, I got closer and closer toward Harriet and I could see the shock in her face.

"But it hasn't even been a week!" I said, my disbelief slowly turning into curiosity. I could tell Harriet was thinking the same thing from her furrowed brow and her fingers tapping on the side of her leg.

We quickly jogged toward the Box where Sonya and Marie were already waiting. Marie gagged at me. "Gross, did you even brush your teeth?"

I rolled my eyes at her but quickly went back to the Homestead to do just that. The Homestead had two bathrooms on the first floor where everyone could see and there were already a few girls inside, squeezing toothpaste onto old plastic toothbrushes and furiously untangling knots. Greta tossed me a toothbrush and I slipped behind a line of girls behind the sink.

Five minutes later, I was back at the Box and the Gladers moved aside so I was next to Sonya and Harriet. As we waited for the Box to come up, Jenny arrived and handed out sandwiches to us for breakfast. No one wanted to leave in case they missed the Box coming up with another Blondie.

A faint rumbling alerted me and I sat straight up, waiting. The rumbling grew louder and louder until we could see the Box shooting up and clattering to a sudden stop. I watched as the Gladers helped pull up the metal doors and Sonya jumped in, landing lightly on her feet.

Sonya bent down, ready to comfort the confused and scared Blondie, but she stopped. Her jaw dropped slightly as she stared at the newest Glader.

"Whaddya see?" Harriet called, peering into the Box.

Sonya gulped and said in a quiet voice, "It's a boy."

Immediately, the Glade exploded with sound. Voices fighting over each other to be heard, shrill exclamations of surprise, questions on how on Earth he had gotten there. I could see Harriet calling for quiet, but her voice was tiny and ignored in the chaos.

I took a deep breath and bellowed, "STUFF IT!"

The uproar of voices slowly calmed to urgent whispers and I said, "Listen to Harriet for a second, will you?"

Everyone's attention turned to Harriet and she gestured toward Sonya. Sonya opened her mouth and said in a shaky voice, "That's not even half of it. I think - I think the stick's dead."

A hushed silence fell over the Glade like a heavy blanket. The Gladers exchanged nervous looks and we all stared down at Sonya, who had carefully propped the Blondie up against the Box wall in a way so we could all see him.

He had light olive skin and dark, short hair. His eyes were closed and we all scooted a little closer toward the Box, watching as Sonya studied him curiously.

The boy abruptly sat up straight and his eyelids flew open, but he wasn't really looking. He had a wandering look in them like he was seeing but not exactly registering things.

"Rachel," he gasped, eyes darting around the Box and finally settling on Rachel, who had been pushed in front of the group. "Rachel, everything is going to change."

With that ominous statement hanging in the air, the boy collapsed back down, his eyes still half-open.

Everyone froze and waited, but the boy seemed to have gone back to that half-dead state he had been when he arrived. Sonya poked him with her foot and when he didn't move, she sighed.

"Well, that was cheery," Marie joked weakly, but no one laughed.

Sonya called, "Medics! We need Medics!" Clary and Molly slipped through the crowd and joined Sonya in the Box, They set up some pulley thing and with the help of some other Gladers, they pulled the boy high enough to put him on a stretcher and carry him to the Healing Shack.

Just as Clary and Molly were about to bring him away. I noticed something crumpled in the boy's tight fist. I called for them to stop and pried the boy's tight fist open.

A wrinkled paper dropped out and I caught it before it could hit the ground. Gladers surrounded me as I slowly flattened it out on my leg as best I could, then read it out loud.

"He's the last one. Ever."

***

WORD COUNT: 1887

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From Wikipedia:

"Greta Tintin Eleonora Ernman Thunberg is a Swedish environmental activist who has gained international recognition for promoting the view that humanity is facing an existential crisis arising from climate change."

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Idk how to feel about this one, it's definitely the longest but not the best written. Far from it, actually. The beginning part about WICKED is the weakest, I think, but I'm kind of a pantser and just make it up as I go, pretty much. And I think it was pretty important, so yeah. Also, there weren't any really important names in this chapter that I could find so I randomly added in a Greta. I actually love Greta Thunberg and think she's a really amazing role model.