It feels weird to be here, actually writing the sequel. Anyway, thanks for deciding you liked the first one enough to read this one! It means more to me than you know.

Disclaimer: I don't own the 'Scorch Trials', my dudes.

That night, I dreamed of darkness.

The world around me was pitch black, and I was unable to see a thing. My glow wasn't working. The ground was hard and cold underneath my feet. All around me, I could hear screams, Griever moans and shrieks, but it was all as if from far away. I began to hear people calling my name.

"Ghost, help me!"

It was Thomas, I was sure of it. I ran towards where I thought his cries were coming from, but they never seemed to get any closer. Unable to see, I tripped over something and fell to my hands and knees. Thomas's screams for help got louder, and others joined his voice. Minho. Newt. Teresa. Clint. Chuck.

All of them were begging for me to help them, as the Griever sounds got louder, and all the voices were coming from different directions. They sounded so far away. No matter how much I ran, I never seemed to be getting any closer.

My eyes flew open, and I stared up at the bed above me, chest heaving. I was still reeling from the nightmare, so it took me a few seconds to realize I wasn't alone in the room. I heard them first, but then my glow kicked in and I could see them in the pale blue light.

Two of the people, a man and a woman, wore lab coats and dark pants, while the others, maybe there were four of them, were dressed like soldiers, weapons strapped across their backs. Their faces were covered, goggles over their eyes. The two scientist-looking people in lab coats were bent over Teresa's bed. One of them had what looked like an oxygen mask pressed over her mouth and nose.

"Teresa!" I shouted, making all heads turn towards me. Stupid? Maybe, but I needed Teresa to wake up. Sure enough, Teresa's eyes flew open, widening, and kicked and struggled to get away from the two people standing over her, wrenching away from the mask.

"What the—" one of the soldier cried out, in a gruff older man's voice. "Grab them!"

The soldier nearest to the door snatched Teresa's arm as she tried to run, pinning her arms behind her back and holding her in place. Teresa fought against them weakly, but seemed dazed. I wondered if it had something to do with whatever they had been making her breathe.

With the exit blocked, I leapt up out of bed and onto the top bunk of the bed to my left, trying to reach my machete before I was inevitably caught. I was about to dig into the mattress to retrieve it, cursing myself for hiding it do well, when a hand wrapped around my ankle in an iron grip and yanked me to the floor with a thud.

The soldier pinned me like Teresa, but I kicked back at them, driving my foot repeatedly into their knee.

"Restrain her!" the older man commanded, and the last remaining soldier came to my captor's aid. Their combined strength was too much; I was forced to my knees, one of them leaning almost painfully on the backs of my shins and the other holding my arms.

Teresa cried out my name, trying to get away, only for her captor to cover her mouth with a gloved hand, muffling her voice.

"There was only supposed to be one of them!" one of the soldiers, the one who had my legs secured, said. His voice was male, and he sounded young.

The one who was holding my arms grunted. "What's with her skin? She's not radioactive is she, Captain?" It was a woman's voice this time.

"No, not exactly. This is the little lab rat who ran away a couple years back," the older man, apparently the captain, said, grabbing my chin. I wrenched my jaw out of his grasp, growling and attempting to bite him. He pulled his hand away quickly. "Found her way into the Maze."

"How is she even still alive?" The first soldier, the young man, asked, disbelieving and sounding almost in awe.

"Doesn't matter," the soldier holding my arms snapped. "What do we do with her, Captain?"

The man stared at me in silence for a moment, and for a second I could see his eyes through his dark goggles, cold and unfeeling. Then, he said:

"Kill her."

"No!" Teresa's shriek was preceded by the pained cry of the soldier holding her, the dark-haired girl having bitten the hand over her mouth.

"Sedate her!" The captain roared, pointing angrily at Teresa. "She was supposed to be unconscious during transfer."

I strained against the people holding me while the Captain grabbed the oxygen mask from the scientists and pressed it to Teresa's face himself, turning up the dial on the canister.

"Oh, wait, not that much!" One of the scientists, a woman, cried as Teresa's eyes rolled back and she fell unconscious. The captain ignored her while the soldier holding Teresa dragged her body from the room, and whirled back around to me. The captain crouched down to be at my level.

"Nothing to say, little girl?"

I glared, and the man pulled up his mask, his now exposed face smug at my silence. I grinned widely, and confusion furrowed his brows.

"Go to hell," I said, and spat in his face.

The man's face contorted in fury, wiping his face with a gloved hand in disgust. Smug satisfaction gave me the courage to stare defiantly into his eyes, even as he raised his gun and pointed it at my head.

"Stop!" If it weren't for my advanced hearing, I wouldn't have heard the voice, which seemed to echo from inside the soldiers' helmets. The captain lowered his weapon immediately, bringing his free hand up to his ear.

"But sir—"

"Leave the girl alive. That's an order."

The captain didn't look happy about that order at all, but he didn't argue with the voice in his earpiece.

"What do you want us to do with her, sir? Take her to B?"

"Negative. Knock her out. Oh, and Captain Singh?" The voice paused. "Make sure to take away her bioluminescence."

Captain Singh brightened marginally at that, motioning one of the labcoated individuals to come forward. The woman approached, taking out a hypodermic needle and a bottle of dark orange liquid from the bag at her side. "Yes sir."

I struggled back, but the soldier woman holding me grabbed my arm and forced it still as the scientist injected the orange solution into my arm.

I watched in horror as, from the point the needle was inserted, my glow began to go out. The darkness spread, leeching the blue color and light from my skin. With my glow dying, my vision was fading away. However, I still managed to see the smirk on Singh's face before he slammed the butt of his gun into my head and the world plunged into darkness.

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To say Minho woke up in a bad mood would be a tragic understatement. He had gone to bed thinking he might finally be somewhere safe, and had woken up to see that taken away.

There were bars on the windows of their room that he hadn't noticed the night before, but he was glad for them. Because those bars were the only things keeping them out.

The glass of the windows had been broken from the outside, and there were people clawing at the bars and screaming. Minho was hesitant to call them people, because they were horrific, covered in boils and sores and open wounds that were clearly infected.

Thomas, who had been sleeping in the bunk below Minho, woke up and was staring at one of the people, a man with a nasty slit on his cheek who screamed: "I'm a bloody crank! Kill me, kill me, kill me!"

Minho hopped down from his bunk and put a hand on Thomas's shoulder, making the other boy jump.

"They're everywhere," Minho said solemnly, staring in disgust at the man in the window who was still shrieking the same sentence over and over again. "And there's no sign of the shanks who rescued us."

Minho thought of Ghost and Teresa. He didn't like that the girls had been separated from the rest of the group, though it didn't surprise him. The runner really wished they were here now, because he had no idea where they were or if they were safe. Did their room have windows and people too? Did their windows have bars? Or had they been left vulnerable?

Not knowing was killing him.

Minho pushed those thought to the back of his mind and focused on Thomas, who was talking.

"Do all the windows have these bars? Have any of them gotten in?"

"No, or we'd probably all be dead. And yeah, all barred. Didn't see 'em last night through those stupid frilly curtains."

Thomas nodded. "Where's Newt?"

"Here," Newt said, walking up from the side. Thomas turned to look at him.

"What's going on?"

Newt crossed his arms. "Think I know? Bunch of crazies want to eat us for breakfast by the looks of it." He looked around at the windows. "We need to find another room to have a Gathering. All this noise is driving nails through my buggin' skull."

"We should find Ghost and Teresa," Minho said as he and Newt approached the door. "Make sure they're ok."

Minho was filled with a driving need to protect her, which was absolutely absurd. Ghost could take care of herself; she was one of the strongest people he knew. Plus, he knew she wouldn't appreciate the sentiment. She hated being thought of as weak, as someone who needed to be protected. Still, he couldn't shake the feeling.

"Good idea," Newt said, and Minho reached for the brass doorknob and jiggled it fiercely. It was locked. "Here, let me."

Minho raised his eyebrows but stepped aside, and Newt tried at the door for a while before stepping back.

"It's locked," Newt muttered, and Minho crossed his arms in annoyance.

"No, really?" He rolled his eyes. "No wonder you were named after Isaac Newton—you're a shuck genius."

The blond Glader had gotten used to Minho's smart-ass comments, so he said nothing, instead ordering everyone to find something to break the handle. The room was so loud, with everyone skittering about and the Cranks screaming on top of it all.

"I wish those shuck Cranks would shut up!" Minho snapped loudly, glowering at the nearest one, a bloody woman. Frypan looked at the keeper of the runners curiously.

"Crank?"

"That's what they call themselves. Haven't you head it?"

Newt made an agitated sound, glaring. "I don't care if you call em' pussy willows. Just find me something to break the shucking door!"

Danny, the curly-haired, pale-eyed boy who had worked in the Gardens in the Glade, came forward and handed Newt a bright red fire extinguisher. Newt took it and slammed it down on the handle with a resounding crack. In three hits, the handle fell to the floor and the door cracked open just enough to reveal total darkness beyond.

"Let's go," Newt said, stepping forward, but was stopped by the dark-haired cook.

"Wait, are we sure we want to go out there?" Frypan asked. "What if that door was locked for a reason?"

"What, and stay in here with these crazies?" Minho shook his head. "I think not. Besides." Minho kicked the door open. "You should've said something before we blasted the lock to bits."

"I hate it when you're right," Frypan muttered as the Gladers stared out into the dark; somehow opening the door hadn't brightened it in the slightest.

Damn right, Minho thought to himself. Then, he said: "Shuck it, I'll go first."

The runner stepped out into the suffocating blackness, shuffling his feet a bit with each step and feeling out in front of him carefully. He couldn't see a shuck thing, and the common room smelled horrible. He tried to remember where he'd seen the light switch last night and head in that direction.

Suddenly, something met his outstretched hands, something stiff and covered in what felt like cloth. It swung back and forth when Minho ran into it, like a pendulum hanging from the rafters.

"Whoa!" Minho felt his way around whatever it was. "Careful, guys. Something…weird is hanging from the ceiling."

From somewhere behind him there was a short screech of metal being dragged across the floor, followed by a grunt from Newt.

"Watch out for tables," the British Glader announced.

Frypan's voice rang out: "Anyone know where the lights are?"

"Where I'm headed," Newt said, and Minho made a disgusted sound as he ran into another one of the hanging things. "Here it is!"

Minho was temporarily blinded by the sudden burst of light, raising his hand to cover his eyes. When he blinked the light spots from his vision, he let out a cry of shock when he saw the scene around him clearly.

The things that were hanging from the ceiling were bodies.

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Minho had seen bodies before.

He was one of the original Gladers; he'd been there since day one. He'd been there when the first boys ended up dead when they found out the Maze was populated by Grievers, mechanical monsters that wanted to kill them. He was there when that kid had tried to rappel down the Box hole and had gotten sliced in half. He had been one of the ones to find the bodies of Gladers that had been banished or trapped in the Maze overnight, mutilated all to hell and barely recognizable.

These bodies, the people who had rescued them, his mind supplied, were not bloody or deformed. Their faces were blue and their tongues lolled out, and that was somehow more disturbing.

Minho made his way over to Newt and Thomas, cursing under his breath. Thomas had his eyes closed and his face screwed up. Newt asked him what was wrong, and Thomas made a noncommittal gesture to the bodies around them.

"You looked in pain."

"I…I was trying to reach Teresa. Ya know, with my mind. But I can't."

Ah, right. Thomas and Teresa had a telepathy thing going on. Honestly, it wasn't the craziest thing Minho had ever heard, but it was still weird. Thomas continued, looking troubled.

"We have to find where they put Teresa, and Ghost."

"He's right," Minho called. "Spread out, find them!"

Thomas made a beeline towards the far side of the room. "Might've already."

Minho looked towards where the runner-in-training was headed. There was a yellow door with a brass handle, and that's when Minho saw the figure sprawled on the ground outside the door.

Minho rushed forward, the others close behind him. It was Ghost, her blonde hair spread in a messy halo around her face. Her chest rose and fell steadily; she might have been sleeping peacefully if not for the ugly purple bruise on her forehead.

"Ghost!" Minho sank to his knees and cradled her face in his hands, brushing a few strands of her hair back. "Ghost, wake up."

Clint crouched down beside the unconscious Glader across from Minho. Newt and Thomas hovered around them too.

"She was hit with something heavy," the Medjack observed, pointing to the bruise. His expression darkened. "And that," he pointed to a small circular wound on her arm. "Looks like a needle mark. She was injected with something."

What happened to you? Minho thought, inspecting her sleeping face, wishing those dark green eyes would open.

"We need to find Teresa." Thomas said worriedly. "She could be in trouble."

Newt passed Thomas the fire extinguisher. "Your turn to break a buggin' door handle."

I hope you enjoyed this. Chapter 2 should be up Friday, but probably later at night depending on if I wrangle my sleep schedule (unlikely).

Question of the Day: Do you have pets? If so, what kind?

My answer: A dog named Dash and an aquarium.