The ground rushed away beneath Calvin's feet. The ivy on the walls blended into a green blur corridor after corridor. He could hear the griever right behind him, but with each sharp turn, the shrieking and mechanical screeching dimmed. Then it stopped.
Cavin jammed his foot into the ground and skidded to a halt, listening, but there was nothing to hear. He'd outrun the griever.
He'd outrun the griever.
"That wasn't the plan," he murmured, looking back the way he'd come. The Glade wasn't too far from here, only three or four turns away. The Doors would close in under ten minutes. There was a model to rebuild.
But Calvin hadn't even gotten a good look at the griever; it seemed to be a giant spider, but what was it made of? Was it man-made at all? What about the stinger, where was it? What the hell were they running from? How did they leave the Maze during the day and come out at night? If there's a way in, there's a way out. It had been his theory for months. The grievers had to go somewhere during the day. Maybe that was where the Gladers were supposed to go to escape.
"It's probably nothing," he said loudly, looking to where he knew the Glade would be. But his legs refused to cooperate. He had to know more about the grievers. It had to be important. And the longer he stood here, the faster his chance—the only chance he'd gotten in a year—was slipping away.
At the moment he decided to go back, a metallic clank sounded from the hall that Calvin had emerged from moments earlier, followed by a cacophony of whirring and clicking that was slowly getting louder. Apparently I did not lose the griever. Calvin glanced up and down the corridor, saw a convenient offshoot. He ducked around the corner into a dead end, sticking his head out as far as he dared.
A metal leg came out from behind the wall and punched into the ground. A second leg joined it in a chorus of mechanical creaking. Bit by bit, the griever rounded the corner. He had been right—it was kind of like a giant spider. But it was also part machine. The legs and tail were clearly robotic, but the body was unidentifiable. Is it even alive? He couldn't kill what wasn't alive, and if the grievers were cyborgs, this escaping business was going to be significantly more complicated than he'd been hoping.
The griever was still moving forward, slowly and surely. This was its territory, and Calvin was the intruder. It had nothing to fear.
Calvin, on the other hand, had plenty to fear. The Doors would be closing in under five minutes, and the fastest route back to the Glade took him right in front of the griever. With every passing moment, the risk of moving doubled. Even so, those odds were still better than they would be if he was caught out at night. Before he lost his nerve, Calvin darted out from the dead end hallway, sprinting for the left turn that would lead him home.
Something slammed him into the wall. The world went dark for a moment, all the air knocked from his lungs. For a split second, he existed only in cold hard stone and the sound of shrieking metal.
Then his vision cleared, though his head was still spinning. The griever loomed above him, tail flicking back and forth like a cat's. Calvin stayed still. He didn't trust himself to get up and move fast enough, and any sudden movement would be sure to provoke the griever. But it didn't seem like it needed much provoking. The truth stared him in the face: he had seconds to pull off something amazing or he'd be torn apart.
But fear had seeped into him, an impediment dropped into the center of his brain that nothing slipped through.
Then the griever struck and the moment had ended.
AN: Hello again! It feels like it's been forever (my personal project has been keeping me preoccupied and I almost forgot I had an account!) but I'm back! Sorry that this chapter was shorter than the others.
So... Calvin's dead? I wasn't really planning on that, not that it'll change the story too much (never fear, I have the story plotted to a certain extent, so hopefully it won't disappoint). Calvin is a very dear OC to me, I'll probably bring him back for some other fic.
Until next time, then—stay safe, everyone!