This one's a long one! T/W - Lil bit of Gore


I wasn't exactly excited to be back in the maze. But it would have been worse waiting around back in that clearing, glade-like place.

Neither place felt free. In the maze was like being slowly entombed on all sides. But that other place was like a stagnant pond. No where to run.

Blondie walked in front, quickly turning on a dime whenever it suited him to go a different way.

Floofy followed behind, jaw clenched and clearly on edge. He kept looking around like something was after him.

Curly came next, doing his best to scrawl the maze down on the small piece of paper Smart Guy had given us. He wasn't the best artist.

I brought up the rear, moving with less urgency so that I would fall behind them, then catch up as Blondie hovered at intersections, deciding which way to go.

We were wandering aimlessly.

"Are we heading in the right direction?" Blondie called back to Curly.

"I... Think so..." Curly said, turning the map in his hands, trying to make sense of it.

They were attempting, roughly, to head towards the other side where Dreads was yesterday. It was taking longer than they had expected. My stomach grumbled loudly. I was starting to wish we had taken Smart Guy's advice and grabbed some food before we started off for the day.

Floofy looked back at me. "Can you shut that thing up?"

"My stomach?" I couldn't tell if he was being serious.

"I could hear it from miles away." Floofy said dryly.

"Good. Maybe Dreads will hear it and come looking for us." Sarcasm bit at the edges of my words.

"And maybe he'll think you're a monster coming to eat him and run the other way." Floofy slapped the sarcasm right back.

Curly looked up in alarm. "You don't really think there's something else in here, do you?"

"No." Blondie said immediately. "Don't be ridiculous."

Floofy just shrugged. I rolled my eyes.

The three boys walking in front of me fell through the floor.

I started, unsure what just happened. They screamed, grabbing onto stone as the ground crumbled away beneath them.

I dropped to my knees, grabbing Curly's hand. He was closest. Floofy swung his other hand up to get a better grip but Blondie, furthest down was hanging on by fingers. Below the path had opened up into a rocky pit several feet down.

I tried to pull Curly up, my sweaty hands loosing their grip on his skin.

Floofy hung on tight, looking for handholds to grab and pull himself up.

Curly let go of the edge to grab my arm with one hand. I shouted in surprise at the movement, almost pitching forward off the edge with them. My toes snagged on a crack and I stabilized myself. Our hands turned white with how tight we gripped each other. It was enough to stop the slipping and I started backing up, pulling him out of the pit.

Floofy was starting to grunt as he moved. Shimmying along his hand hold to get closer to Curly and I.

Curly was halfway out of the pit. I let go of him and immediately grabbed Floofy.

Blondie slipped. I almost let go of Floofy in shock.

I watched Blondie fall, his head smacking painfully against stone at the bottom.

I froze, too numb to move until Curly grabbed Floofy's other arm and started pulling him up. I snapped out of it and together we dragged Floofy out of the pit. The three of us immediately looked over the edge again, trying to figure out a way down.

Blondie groaned loudly, moving gingerly to roll over onto his side. The drop had been a good eight feet at least. He was lucky to be alive.

"Don't move alright?" Curly called down to him. "We'll get you out of there hold on." Floofy was already on his feet, looking for the nearest growth of vines.

Blondie looked dazed as he moved to a half sitting position.

"You okay?" I called down to him. "Blondie?"

"Longlocks! Come help us with this!" Curly and Floofy were tugging on a particularly sturdy vine.

Below in the pit, Blondie said a word to himself.

"What?" I called down, still unsure of his well being. For some reason I was terrified. He had to be okay. He had to be.

"George!" He shouted. "George!" The two boys stopped and came to look over into the pit. "I remember something! My name!"

"George?" I tried the word out on my tongue. Blondie was better.

"George!" Curly shouted smiling. Floofy was grinning from ear to ear. "Hold on George, we'll have you out in a jiffy!"

Together the three of us pulled loose the vine and lowered it to pull George out of the pit. He came up looking elated, though he was bleeding pretty bad from the gash in his head. He smacked us all on the shoulders, laughing.

"You alright?" Floofy asked, still grinning.

"Never better. Come on, let's go find our missing friend." He started off and we all hurried to catch up.

"So do you remember anything else?" I call up to him.

"Not yet! But maybe I will." He sounded more hopeful than he had since we first stepped out of the box. He glanced back at me, eyes shining and grinning excitedly. My heart fluttered alarmingly in my chest.

My pace slowed for a moment as the other three passed me. What was that? That feeling I had just from his smile...

We turned a corner and Curly started searching through his pockets frantically.

"Wait! Everyone wait a second!" We slow down at the sound of his warning.

"What's wrong?" Blondie... George asked.

"The map." I felt the bottom drop out of my stomach as he spoke. "I must have dropped it back in the pit."

Everyone stared at him, hoping this was some kind of poor joke.

He looked back at us, helplessly. We immediately started back.

"Its alright, we just need to head back to the pit. We haven't gone that far." He came to a halt at a crossroad.

Floofy looked nervous. "Anyone remember which way we came?" George leaned against the side of the wall looking off balance.

"Hey, you good?" I asked.

"Fine." Came his short reply. I didn't believe that for one second. I came up behind him, pulling his head back to look at the gash from the rock.

It was still bleeding. "We need to bandage this. Quickly." Curly was already tearing off a section of his pant leg to wrap the wound.

I wasn't sure what to properly do, but I knew the bleeding had to stop. George tried to push me away, mumbling over and over that he was fine but Floofy and I forced him to sit as Curly tied off the bandage.

George hissed in pain. "Its too tight!"

"Shut up. This is for your own good." I snapped back.

"You trying to squeeze my head off woman?" I felt like I should be angry at him, but the way he said it sent strange shivers down my spine and I felt a familiar heat rise to my face.

Curly finished tying the bandage off and we let George stand again. Floofy lent him a shoulder to lean on and looked down the three pathways. "We'll split up." The Asian boy said. "George and I will go this way. You keep going ahead. Longlocks, you take the left path."

I nodded, trying to hide the distinct fear I felt of wandering through the maze alone.

"Only make three turns." George instructed. "Remember your path, if you don't find anything, come back here and wait for the others. We're not going to lose each other, you hear?"

"Right." Curly nodded. "I don't see anyway for this to go wrong." He said it so casually, it took me a moment to realize it was sarcasm.

I smirked and punched him on the arm. "Sassy, coming from the kid who dropped the map in the first place."

"Yeah, everyone knows being sassy is my thing." Floofy looked indignant.

"Since when?" I scoffed.

"Look," Floofy sighed looking me in the eye. "Just because you have the awareness and observational skills of a crowbar-"

"Are you two done?" George interjected, looking irritable. "How bout less insults, more maze solving?" Floofy flicked his hair, imbued with every atom of sassiness in his body, then shifted George to bear less of the weight and the two of them started off down the rightside path.

Curly laughed through a sigh. "I don't know whether to be impressed or amused."

"Neither." I shook my head. "That boy is trying way too hard."

"What's wrong with trying hard?" Curly watched me for a response, the hint of a smile on his face.

"Well... Nothing... I suppose..." I met his eyes for an awkwardly long time before I turned abruptly and started down the left path.

"Be careful!" Curly called after me before turning and heading down the center path. I could hear his footsteps echo away. And I was suddenly alone.

I felt my legs slowly turning into jelly as I walked. I rested my hand on the corner of the wall as I came to an intersection. My hand was shaking. I pulled it against my body to steady it. I wasn't scared. I wasn't.

It was the silence, I think, that got to me. The air has always been this stifling, the pathways just as dark. But now it was quiet, save for the unearthly echo of my feet on the stone, my breathing which came heavier despite the fact that I was standing still.

Then I began to notice the stench. The foul sent of bile. The iron tang of blood.

I looked around the corner.

A viserated mass of carnage was splayed across the floor and up the far wall. The red of blood looked black in the dim. I could make out vague shapes. An arm here, a leg, a kidney. A mass of blood covered dreadlocks.

I sank to the ground, unable to move. I could feel my brain shutting down, as I stared numbly at the gore in front of me. How? How did this happen? How... Who...

Bile rose in my throat. Something must've done this to him. Something else was in here.

The faintest of breezes began to blow, wafting the foul scent down the path towards me. I threw up water and bile as my stomach tried to empty an already foodless stomach.

I heard something. Voices, coming down the path. It was coming for me. Whatever had killed Dreads was back, and I was the next victim.

I tried to stand, run, but my legs wouldn't cooperate. My foot slipped in bile as the voices grew louder.

It was calling for me "Girly! Longlocks!" My legs felt like liquid lead. I struggled to my feet, if I could stand, that would be enough. I'd have to fight. If I could just scare it off, maybe I'd have a chance. "Longlocks!"
It was right around the corner. I swung wildly as the monster came around the corner. My fist connected solidly with one of the two headed beast's jaws. It went stumbling away, tripping over too many limbs.

A smaller creature appeared behind it. I swung again but it ducked, grabbing my arms to stop me. I tried to break free as it started yelling at me.

"Woah! Woah its just us! Calm down!" The monster looked me in the eye and I suddenly recognized him. It was Curly. Floofy and George untangled themselves from each other.

What little strength I had mustered into my limbs immediately left and I clung to Curly in relief.

He hugged me tightly as dry sobs chocked out of my chest. "Its alright. I'm here." He tried to comfort me, but the bewilderment was evident in his voice.

"Shit." Floofy mumbled under his breath. They had seen the carnage ahead of us. I tried to calm down, pull myself together. It wasn't working. Curly stroked my hair, speaking in a low murmur. His voice resonated in his chest, sounding deeper in comparison to his usual boyish chirping. Slowly I gathered my wits.

"Yeah its him." George reported from where he crouched by the remains. "But what did it to him?"

"We have to leave. Now." Floofy seemed suddenly on edge, muscles tense.

"If this thing is around, we would have encountered it by now." George reasoned. "We're in no more danger now than we were before."

"Not that." Floofy hissed. "The wind's picking up. The maze is closing again."

Curly let go of me quickly, scrambling for the map from his pocket. George stormed over and grabbed both of us by the arm, hauling us to our feet and pushing us back towards the mapped path. Floofy was already several paces in front of us, working up to a jog.

As I forced my legs to move, the adrenalin started kicking in. I picked up speed so George could stop dragging me along. He was looking more stable on his feet, which was good because soon we were full on sprinting, desperately trying to keep up with Floofy who looked like he was trying to outrun death itself. Then I realized we were.

Floofy had grabbed the map from Curly and was leading the charge at full throttle.

The wind was picking up, roaring in my ears as I kept sprinting, my lungs desperately pleading for me to stop, to take a breather, give them a chance to catch up. My heart thundered in my chest, chanting "run, run, run". My feet were numb.

We turned corner after corner, shoes screeching as we flung ourselves around corners and launched down corridors.

There! At the end of the path rose a tall opening, light from the clearing pouring through. We didn't stop.

We hurtled across stone. Grinding of gears echoed off the walls and the ground trembled. Ahead of us, the sliver of light began closing.

George and I passed the other two, longer legs reaching farther as the wind funneled behind us, pushing us out.

We burst out into the light, pivoting quickly to look back. Floofy was almost to the door, Curly a few paces behind him. It was just like George and Dreads. Not again. I can't watch it happen again. Floofy tripped, tumbling into the closing doors. George and I were immediately there, grabbing his arms and pulling him out of the way.

Curly launched himself in between, scraping against the doors as he tried to push himself through. I reached in, grabbing his arm and hauled him through. We went flying backwards through the dirt as the maze doors came shut behind us.

I stared at the giant stone doors and let out a disbelieving laugh. "We made it."

Floofy whooped loudly, jumping up and down with excitement. George smiled to himself, pushing sweating blonde hair out of his eyes.

I stared for a moment before Floofy punched me in the arm, grinning from ear to ear. "Guess what Longlocks?"

I growled at the name. "What?"

"You can't call me Floofy anymore."

"Say's who?"

"Minho." Floofy grinned. "My name's Minho."

All three of us stared at him before breaking out into cheers, slapping him on the back and shouting his name as boys emerged from the woods, to see if we'd made it back.

Smart Guy made his way to the front. "Did you find him?"

Smiles fell as George straightened up and nodded. "We found him." They were not going to like this.


Ahhhhh I don't know how to feel about this chapter... Did it make sense? Was it too cliche and dramatic? I feel it probably was...

Thanks for reading!