“Theresa looked at her best friend and wondered what it would be like to forget him.”

Theresa is a protagonist from the first three novels in the Maze Runner series. This line recalls the first scene of the first novel, The Maze Runner, as Thomas wakes alone in the Box, an elevator that opens into a walled-in Glade. This prologue connects the first three books to The Kill Order and expresses the attempt to find a cure for a virus that will be released in the early chapters of this prequel.

“The smells hit Mark first. It was always that way when going to the Central Shack. Rotting undergrowth, cooking meat, pine sap. All laced with that scent of burning that defined the world after the sun flares. Not unpleasant, really, just haunting.”

This description allows the reader to center themselves within the genre, expressing through sensory detail that this is a dystopian society. The setting plays an important role in the novel in orienting the reader to the genre and providing contrasts that divide the survivors between those living in settlements and those living in upscale neighborhoods who have risen to power in the new government.

“It was the first time Mark had seen one of the enormous airships since the sun flares happened, and the sight of it was jolting. He couldn’t think of any reason a Berg—one that had survived the disaster—would have to come flying through the mountains.”

Mark describes the arrival of an airship that is a relic of the past. This airship is a part of the technology that was common in society before the solar flares but has since become a thing of the past. The sight of it takes him back to a different time, making the Berg a symbol of the modern conveniences and technology that disappeared along with most of the human population during and after the solar flares.