Chapter 12:
Days turned into weeks, and weeks were turning into months. Two to be exact. Two continuous months of running the maze and not a single thing had changed. No clues as to how to get out of the Glade, or unusual changes in the patterns. To be perfectly honest, Mary was starting to feel annoyed herself. Everyday when her and Newt would come back from running their section, she'd die a little bit inside knowing today was another failure. She was starting to doubt there was even a way out of here herself. She would never be able to admit that to the rest of the guys though. Telling them that there probably wasn't a way out? That would crush everyone's spirits. She knew practically everyone's hope was gone by now but that little candle in the darkness, that small sliver of light was Mary's hope. And telling them she didn't think there was a way out would blow out that light in an instant. People would stop running the maze, they'd stop gardening, stop building, stop cooking... It would start a chain reaction and things would fall apart and people would die.
She put her palms down on the table, head hanging low as she looked at the map she drew today. Identical to last weeks map on the same day. She squeezed her eyes shut as she felt a tear falling down her cheek. She wiped it away in a flash and thanked the heavens she was the only one in the room. She had insisted on mapping the route by herself today, not wanting Newt there to peer over her shoulder and sigh as he saw the familiar strokes of the identical map. She noticed it was hard on him most of all. He was getting frustrated. He was more agitated and he barely talked to anyone after coming back into the Glade... It was starting to worry her. She crumpled the map and tossed it at the wall as hard as she could. Who cares if it got drawn out? It was just the same as the dozens of other maps.
She walked out of the map room, shutting the big metal door behind her and walked as far away from it as she possibly could. Right now all she wanted to do was lock herself away in her room and stay there forever. She glanced over at Nick, Alby and Minho standing around the open box. She almost forgot, today marked another day a Greenie arrived, which meant more supplies. By the looks of things, the supplies had already been organized and sent to their designated places. Still, they stood around it, Nick pointing at the box as he frantically spoke. Mary couldn't help but wonder what they were talking about, and found herself already walking in their direction.
"Hey, what's going on?" She asked as she walked up. The three boys turned to look at her as they stopped talking.
"We're getting desperate." Alby spoke up first.
"Okay?" She asked curiously. "What does that mean?"
"We were thinking of sending someone down in the box, maybe that could be a way out." Nick explained.
"Who were you going to send?" She asked. They all kind of looked at each other and shrugged. "Okay fine, I'll go." She said as she went to jump in, but Minho stopped her.
"whoa whoa whoa, that might not be such a great idea." He said, pulling her away from the box.
"Why?" She asked.
"You're one of the best runners we got, if this doesn't work, I don't want to have to replace you with some random shank. You're too valuable." Minho told her.
"Okay, who then?" She asked.
"We were thinking one of the Sloppers." Minho crossed his arms. "But only if we can get one of them to agree to do it."
"What about David?" She asked.
"Yeah, David's always looking for a way to show us what he's made of." Alby said. "I'll go ask him." Alby bolted in the direction of the homestead.
"If this works... Oh man, you just wait. We're all going to get out of here." Nick said excitedly.
Mary smiled. What if it doesn't work?
Before they could discuss it any further, Alby ran back with a few other Gladers, David being one of them.
"You got a job for me?" David asked Nick.
"Sure do man!" Nick patted him on the shoulder. "We need someone to go down the box and see if they can get out of here. Whadya say? Wanna be the first one outta here?"
"Hell yeah." David smiled. With a pat on the back, Nick escorted him to the box.
It wasn't long before the other boys got a rope and tied it around him. They formed a line and Nick explained to him that if things started to freak him out, to tug on the rope three times so the guys would pull him up. David held onto the edge of the box as the guys began lowering him down. Mary took a look down the empty abyss of the box. It looked like there was no end to it. It looked like a black hole that went on forever. As the boys lowered him down, David frantically looked around and couldn't see anything but the sky above him from inside the box. He looked like he was fifteen feet down the box now.
"David, are you good?" She shouted down at him. He gave her a thumbs up even though she could see how scared he looked. Mary looked back at Nick in the front of the line of boys hoisting him down. "I don't know if this is such a good idea, man. What if it's not enough rope?" She said.
Nick furrowed his eyebrows before asking, "Did he say he was okay?" Mary nodded reluctantly. "Well if he wants us to pull him back up we will." This whole idea was tugging at Mary, she started second guessing the whole idea as she saw David disappear into the darkness. But before she could speak up, a loud echoing buzzing started to grow from deep inside the box.
"Wait guys, stop for a second!" She shouted. The boys halted the rope and listened in. Alby, Nick and Minho listened intently. "Please tell me you can hear that too."
Alby nodded, "What is that?" He asked. Nick shrugged, not knowing what it could be. The sound started to grow and sounded as if it was coming up the box toward them.
"David?" She called out, there was no answer. "David tug on the rope if you can hear me!" She shouted again, still nothing.
"Let's pull him up." Nick ordered. The line formed again and they pulled double time. Mary kept staring down the edge of the box, hoping to see David emerge from the darkness, but all she could see was the rope. "Do you see him yet?"
"No, keep pulling!" Mary shouted. The buzzing could still be heard, the eerie sound was growing as the rope kept being pulled. Out of nowhere, a large razor from one side of the box cut across the entire width of the box, splitting the rope in two as the end David was on fell into the darkness. The buzzing stopped and the razor disappeared. The boys fell back as the weight of David from the end of the rope was suddenly gone. "David!" Mary shouted. She could hear the echo from her voice and nothing else as she stared down at the nothingness.
"What happened?" Minho asked, getting up and leaning in beside her.
"Something just shot out and cut the rope!" She said frantically. The rest of the boys stood around the box, staring down at it wondering what could have happened. The silence stretched on for minutes. The sudden alarm from the box went off and made all the Gladers jump. The ground rumbled around the box as the crate could be seen coming back up, and what they saw next horrified them.
Laying on the grated floor of the box, was David. Well... Only half of David. David from the waist up. Where his legs were, no one could even begin to imagine. The razor must've not just cut the rope, but David as well. The silence in the small crowd continued as they all stared down at the body laying there on the floor. Mary had never seen anything so horrifying in her life. When she finally pried her eyes away from the bloody corpse she saw a small piece of paper laying next to it with a few drops of blood on it. No one made a move to jump down to get it. Mary - being the one who volunteered David to do this in the first place - felt entitled to go down there and see what the paper said. She took a deep breath before jumping down into the box. She looked at David, seeing his lifeless eyes staring back at her as she reached around him to pick up the piece of paper. She knelt beside him and opened up the folded piece of paper and saw five small letters. They were small, but they burned in her head, carving into her skull as she read them over and over again.
"What does it say?" Minho asked. Mary looked up at the sad group of boys.
"Don't try this again-" She stopped there, not saying the last word out loud. She knew if she did she would end up right back in the Slammer. She shoved the note into her back pocket. She cleared her throat and pulled th tears in her eyes back. "Alright you shanks, help me get him out." She had the boys help her and David up out of the box. When they got out, she looked back down at David.
Dinner was silent at their table that night. Some Gladers hadn't heard the news about David yet and seemed to act normal, but the group that had seen what happened to David in the box today hadn't said a word. She wanted to go back to her room even more now, and she thought things were bad before what happened to David. This was just as bad as Shawn getting banished.
Nick spoke up and cleared the silence from the table. "I've got some Gladers making a gravestone for David." He announced. Mary looked over at him and nodded. "And Shawn. He may have not been the best Glader, but he was just trying to get out of here... Just like all of us." Mary could feel Newt looking at her from beside her as she looked back down at her plate and played around with her peas. She felt his hand wrap around hers under the table and she felt it just a bit comforting. She undoubtedly knew that they would be talking later that night.
After dinner was over, Gladers went back to finish the last bits of work they had to do before bed. Mary on the other hand, walked straight up to her room and sat at the end of her bed with her knees clutched to her chest. She didn't cry... She only sat there and thought about how everything was falling apart. She looked to the door when she heard a soft knock coming from the other side.
"Mary, you in there?" She heard Newt's thick accent from behind the door. She didn't answer, just continued to sit there, not wanting the world to know where she was. "I'm going to take that as a yes, I'm gonna come in alright?" A second later the door creaked open and Newt poked his head inside. Mary looked over at him as he came inside fully and closed the door behind him, taking a seat at the end of the bed right next to her. "It wasn't your fault, y'know."
"Isn't it? I was the one who volunteered David to go down there. I was the one who told him it was going to be okay." She stopped and closed her eyes. "I was the one who jumped down there and saw his dead eyes look right through me. Not just that, but to top it all of I've given everyone a burst of false hope.. Including you. I'm sorry."
Newt shook his head, "Mary stop. This isn't your fault. You may have been the one to volunteer him, but his blood isn't on your hands. Nick was there too... And so was Minho and Alby and a whole lot of other people. David wanted to go down there, didn't he?" He explained.
She shook her head as she turned to look at him. "No Newt, you don't get it. " She reached into her back pocket and pulled out the note that laid beside David's body earlier that evening. "I haven't been fully honest with you... Any of you." Newt looked confused for a moment as Mary held out the note. He didn't say anything, but took the piece of paper from her and unfolded it. What he saw surprised him. It read, "Don't try this again, Mary." Newt looked up from the paper after reading it out loud.
"What does this mean?" He asked.
Mary shrugged, not quite sure if she knew the answer herself. "I told you I had a dream when I was asleep. That wasn't true, it wasn't a dream." She paused for a second, saying it out loud for the first time would feel oddly strange. "I... I think it was a memory."
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