The chosen ones - In the fire desert
The Chosen - In der Brandwüsten (Original title: The Scorch Trials ) is the second book in the dystopian science fiction trilogy for young people The Chosen by James Dashner . The first volume, Die Chosen - Im Labyrinth , was published in 2009. The second volume was published on October 5, 2010 under Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House . The German translation by Anke Caroline Burger was published in June 2012.
In 2015, 20th Century Fox made a film adaptation of the novel under the title Maze Runner - The Chosen in the Burning Desert .
content
initial situation
Thomas, Teresa and the other lights are in the first band escape the labyrinth, where the ominous organization ANXIETY ( A EPARTMENT n achepidemische G around research S onderexperimente T odeszone) as subjects were collected and used for an experiment with the aid of a cure for a worldwide deadly plague called Der Brand is sought. Less than half of the initial 50 boys survived martyrdom. FEAR justifies their actions by saying that their experiment serves the good of all humanity and therefore the less relevant victims are legitimate. After the lights were apparently liberated by a rebel group and taken to a hostel, the young people feel safe. What they do not know is that they only survived the first phase of the experiment and everything that has happened since is still part of the experiment and was planned exactly as it was by FEAR .
action
In the hostel, Teresa is separated from the boys' group and placed in a separate bedroom. Already in the first night Thomas is alarmed by Teresa in his mind. When he tries to contact her telepathically again , he no longer succeeds. In the morning the boys are awakened by a terrifying noise and shattering window panes: Several horribly disfigured and wild people are pulling on the bars and begging to be killed. They refer to themselves as "cranks" - those people who are infected with the fire . In search of their rescuers and Teresa, the lights discover that the rebels are all dead, they are locked in the small complex, and all supplies are gone from the kitchen. On the door to Teresa's bedroom they discover the inscription “Teresa Agnes. Group A. Subject A-1. The traitor ”. When the lights break open the locked door, however, they find a boy named Aris, who they learn was the only boy from Group B, a group of girls. A few days ago, she also escaped a labyrinth and was housed in another hostel. The boy doesn't know how he got into Teresa's room overnight. Meanwhile, a deafening signal sounds that lasts for a few minutes. When it was quiet again, the lights noticed some serious changes in the building: On the one hand, the bodies of the killed rebels have disappeared, their dormitory tidied up and all the windows bricked up. On the other hand, the lights notice tattoos on her neck that were not there before. That of Thomas says that he must be killed by Group B; According to Minho's tattoo, he is the leader of Group A.
The lights and Aris have to endure the next three days without food, until one day they find the kitchen full of supplies again. At the same time, a strangely dressed man appears who, protected by an invisible wall, explains the second phase of the experiment. To do this, they should go through a so-called Flat Trans (a kind of gray wall that looks like a teleporter) at 6 a.m. the following day. From the place where the Flat Trans brings them, they should go about 100 miles due north within two weeks, where a "safe haven" is waiting for them. If they refuse to participate, they will die a very cruel death. In addition, the lights are all already infected with the fire and should therefore pass the tests in your own interest. At the end of the second phase, the lights await healing. As instructed by ANGST , the lights (with some provisions) go through the Flat Trans the next morning and get into a kilometer-long, pitch-dark tunnel that already holds fatal dangers in store for them. The tunnel finally leads them to the surface - a dust-dry, scalding hot desert. The unfiltered sunlight leads to burns on the skin in a very short time, so that the boys have to protect themselves from the extremely hot solar radiation with the sheets they have brought with them. Right on their way, the ruins of a former city stretch in the distance and behind them a mountain range, in the direction of which they are heading.
On their day-long march, the lights meet two cranks who warn them not to enter the city. In addition, one night Thomas meets Teresa in a small wooden hut, who, however, behaves very strangely, as if she had to fight against manipulation. The two of them kiss and Teresa tearfully advises Thomas to move on as quickly as possible if he and his friends don't want to be killed. A few kilometers from the city limits, a thunderstorm of supernatural proportions descends on the lights, in which more boys have to lose their lives. The now eleven survivors save themselves in an abandoned skyscraper on the outskirts of the city, where they encounter an initially hostile group of Cranks and their leader Jorge. Thomas is able to convince Jorge to help them cross the city by promising him a cure from The Fire . Together with Brenda, who is also infected, Jorge leads the group to an underground storage room, where the lights get something to eat again after days.
The entrance to the underground is blown up by strangers, separating Thomas and Brenda from the rest of the group. You decide to move on alone and find the lights later. Your path first leads through the dark underground tunnels. But after they are pursued and attacked by a horde of wild cranks and Thomas kills one of them in self-defense, he insists on moving on above ground. During their time together, Thomas and Brenda get closer, which leads to a conflict of conscience and feeling about Teresa, for whose well-being he is still concerned. One morning three menacing looking cranks lie in wait for them and force them to come to a "party". Thomas and Brenda find themselves in a kind of underground club full of dancing, sweaty cranks, where they are given a kind of drug, which initially makes them unrestrained (Brenda tries to kiss Thomas) and then finally passes out. The two come to - tied to chairs - in another basement room, where Thomas is questioned by the Cranks. Meanwhile, the rest of the lights storm the rooms and free their captured friends. However, Thomas suffers a life-threatening gunshot wound in the shoulder. Nevertheless, the group manages to escape from the city. Just as Thomas is about to succumb to his injury, a "Berk" (flying transport ships with which people move over long distances) comes in and takes him on board, where he is treated by a doctor. Three days later, Thomas, meanwhile healed of his injury, is unloaded again at the same place and received by his friends. Shortly after his return, Thomas was telepathically contacted again by Teresa for the first time in his sleep and warned that something bad would soon happen to him. She asks him to absolutely trust her under all circumstances.
After a short rest, the lights continue their migration to the safe haven at sunset. They are surprised by a larger armed group of girls - Group B - led by Teresa and threatening to force Thomas to come with them. Teresa behaves very unscrupulous and callous and pretends not to be able to remember the lights. She also accuses Thomas repeatedly of having done something bad to her, for which he would now be punished. When she has disappeared from the girls' camp the next morning, he engages the other girls in a conversation in which both sides share their experiences. Thomas succeeds in getting the girls, who were already skeptical of their leader, to his side. As a result, Teresa loses the support of her group and goes away alone, furious, while Thomas and the girls move on to the safe haven. A little later she succeeds in separating Thomas from the group on the pretext of wanting to talk to him in plain language. In a small dry patch of forest they meet Aris, who helps Teresa to carry out her assignment. Thomas learns that Teresa was already in telepathic contact with Aris in the labyrinth and that they are both a couple. Her affection for Thomas was a delusion. Teresa opens a hidden door to a dark room, in which Thomas should let her lock him. When he tries to overpower his attackers, he is badly injured in the head by Teresa and is finally forced into the room. At first Thomas thinks he is going to die, but hours later he comes to and is released from the room, halfway well again. Outside, Teresa and Aris wait for him with guilty expressions, explaining that they are very sorry and that they have been forced to do their thing. Completely traumatized by the incident, Thomas does not believe a word of them and feels deeply disgusted with Teresa. Still, he decides to let it rest and move on. He realizes that he will never be able to forgive Teresa for what she did.
After all those involved have overcome the last stage of their journey and have gathered at the presumed destination, they only discover an inconspicuous sign that marks their destination. You decide to wait the rest of the hour until the two weeks are exactly over. Meanwhile another threatening thunderstorm is approaching. From the ground around them, sarcophagus-like objects are brought to the surface, which suggests that there is more to the desert landscape than expected. Terrible monsters, similar to the Griewern, rise from them and attack the young people. Thomas and a few others find a way to turn them off and hide in the sarcophagi to protect themselves from the storm. Just in time for the deadline, a Berk shows up at the scene and collects the survivors, including Minho, Thomas, Newt and Teresa as well as Jorge and Brenda. When the inmates of the Berk consider killing Brenda or Jorge, who are not among the test subjects, Thomas succeeds in preventing this. The lights are told that the experiments are now over. They are again taken to a kind of hostel, where Thomas is separated from the rest of his group shortly afterwards. In a dream he hears Brenda's voice telling him that things are not going well, but that he will soon understand everything. He comes to in a white room with padded walls and seeks contact with Teresa. She tells him that she and the others were put in a dormitory after they arrived. They were told that the fire at Thomas was too advanced and that he had to be taken away. Thomas realizes that he no longer has any feelings for Teresa and is not even sure anymore whether he can trust her - and what she tells him. Thereupon Thomas overcomes the anger towards Teresa and FEAR , and he asks her urgently to leave him alone from now on. Teresa says goodbye with the words " FEAR is good".
epilogue
In the afterword, the leader Ava Paige reports in the form of a memorandum on the successful completion of the experiment in the fire desert. Despite unforeseen developments (Thomas' gunshot wound was not intended) and failures, the organization has made enormous progress. The coming period is also of existential importance for the study and one is confident that the test subjects will voluntarily do what is asked of them after the planned restoration of their memories. In addition, plans are being made to tell the test subjects which of them are immune to the disease - and who are not.
filming
On October 11, 2013, it was announced that 20th Century Fox had acquired the film rights. The screenplay was written by TS Nowlin and directed by Wes Ball. The film was released in German cinemas on September 24, 2015 with the title Maze Runner - The Chosen in the Fire Desert .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Chitwood, Adam: Fox Hires Writer to Start Work on MAZE RUNNER Sequel THE SCORCH TRIALS. October 11, 2013, accessed October 11, 2013 .