Three : Tremors
Newt POV
Three huge, metallic thunks echoed throughout the glade and I scrambled to my feet. Hands shaking, heart thumping painfully, I immediately noticed that the lighting was different. It felt dimmer, darker, I couldn't put it into words very well. Thomas and Minho were standing next to me as well, looking just as shaken up. My blanket lay crumpled at my feet.
"What was that?" Minho asked, his voice louder than I expected in the silent glade. Everyone must be in shock like us. Ignoring his question, I pushed the door open and walked into the main living room of the homestead. I nearly pushed it open into Alby's face as he briskly walked towards where we were trying to sleep.
"Newt, you hear those?" He asked, sidestepping the swinging door.
"Of course we heard them." I rolled my eyes and pushed past him. The lighting was strange, like inside was far darker than it should be. Stepping out of the homestead, I stopped in shock. The gray ceiling we had been getting used to was half black, as if only half of it even existed anymore. The top of the maze walls on that side was also dark, shadows cast down their sides. Streaks of light cut the ceiling down the very middle, as if the electricity had busted on that side. Electricity…
Tripped breaker.
The two words popped into my mind unbidden, and they instantly made sense. Of course the maze ran off electricity, the "sky" too. This entire compound was nothing but a manmade structure. And from the looks and sounds of it, it was failing. Fear iced its way down my spine. Alby's strong hand landing on my shoulder made me jump.
"You guys need to get back out there, I don't care if you eat, sleep, and clunk out there. The only reason I should see you back here again is to tell me you solved the stupid code." Alby said, squeezing my shoulder as he whispered into my ear. I set my jaw and nodded.
"Have Frypan make us a few to-go meals and it's a deal." Minho grunted as he stretched. Alby was already moving towards the kitchen, motioning for him to follow. Thomas moved to stand next to me, reaching out and gently placing a hand on my shoulder. His touch was far kinder than Alby's had been moments ago and I looked over at him.
"It reminds me of a breaker tripping." He said, his gaze focused on the half dark ceiling overhead. I nodded.
"That's what I thought of."
"They really had a fake sky." He continued. "If it's failing, then the maze is probably shut down for good. The grievers too."
"Don't get your hopes up for those bloody things." I groaned, rubbing what little sleep we had gotten out of my eyes. What a miserable 48 hours, and it wasn't even over yet.
"You look terrible."
"Thanks, Tommy." I let out a deep sigh. "Let's go get something to eat, I'm hungry."
An hour later we were back in the maze, backpacks of food and water in tow. As we expected, nothing had changed, and every map we'd drawn before still matched perfectly. Following the most obvious path, we ended up back in front of the cliff. Only this time it wasn't a cliff.
The drop off was only maybe 15 feet down, instead of the bottomless pit we were used to seeing. In front of us was a dimly lit gray wall, maybe 10 feet away. A doorway was cut into the middle, its interior dark. Minho and I stared in disbelief, meanwhile Thomas was running around picking up rocks. Two hurtled through the air and disappeared into the doorway. The failing electricity had revealed this. It had been here this entire time, literally in front of our noses.
"It's the way out…" Minho breathed next to me. I only nodded, unable to find the right words. He had pretty much summed it up. "Come on." With that he backed up out of my sight. I turned in time to see him run and jump off the edge, fly through the air, and land effortlessly inside the doorway. He stood for a moment, frozen, as if waiting for something to happen.
"It's that easy I guess." Thomas huffed a half hearted laugh. Minho moved inside the doorway, disappearing into the inky darkness. Thomas ran past me and jumped. If it was really that easy we would have escaped years ago. I backed up and ran towards the cliff, jumped, and landed clumsily inside.
"There's a computer." Minho breathed. In front of him was a dimly lit screen and a keypad extended out towards him. He was holding the piece of paper out. He glanced back at Thomas and I nervously. Tommy nodded and Minho swallowed, looking back at the keyboard. With a shaking hand, he began typing. I anxiously paced back and forth. Everything felt too easy. The power failing, the maze freezing, the missing grievers, it all gave me the willies. But we had to try. Minho hit enter.
An explosion behind us made all three of us jump and duck. Grinding rock and screeching metal echoed around in the narrow passageway and I clamped my hands over my ears. I carefully moved to peer out the doorway to the cliff, and froze. The cliff wasn't there anymore. Instead, a massive slab of rock had fallen from the ceiling and had crashed down onto the edge, blocking it the way back entirely. The maze was grinding and shaking, like an earthquake was ripping it to pieces. Debris fell from the ceiling, huge cracks split through the stone floor.
"We can't go back!" Thomas yelled next to me, but he sounded like a faint voice in all the chaos. If we couldn't go back, it meant the other gladers could never get out. I dropped to my knees, my hands still tightly held over my ears. The entire glade was cut off from us, we couldn't get back. Alby, Chuck, Gally, Frypan, everyone. Arms hooked around my chest and pulled me to my feet, dragging me backwards. I finally turned and saw Minho motioning towards where the computer had been, a door now swung open. Behind me, the horrible destruction of the maze continued, crunching savagely.
The door led to a steep slide that we jumped onto. Damp with what I hoped was water and dank with mildew, we slid for nearly 30 seconds. Finally, we popped out the end, falling onto the unforgiving stone floor of a dimly lit passageway. Minho hurtled out of the slide and slammed into my back, knocking the air from my lungs.
"The maze…" Thomas was slowly getting to his feet, his face white with shock.
"We can't go back." Minho brushed dust and debris from his shirt as he stood. "It's completely caved in."
"The others?" I looked over at him and he paused for a few seconds. I was still in shock. I couldn't believe, refused to believe that the other gladers were trapped, doomed, dead. I looked away and down the strange hallway we had landed in. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered ominously, half of them completely burnt out. No one was in sight, and the new space was cold, much colder than the glade had been. The water from the slide chilled on my skin and I shivered.
"We'll worry about the others after we figure out where we are." Thomas said, walking forward and aiming for a door in the wall 20 feet away.
"Wait, my backpack." Minho said urgently, spinning on the spot as he looked around. Thomas paused and reached a hand up to one of his shoulder straps on instinct. I only realized then that I too was missing my pack. I swiveled around, searching the ground in the dim light. Minho groaned as he peered up the slide. "They probably got lost in the chaos."
"I still have mine, we'll just split it." Thomas said and I glanced back at him. "Let's just look around first, we still don't know where we are."
"Fine." Minho grunted. We both turned and walked towards Thomas, who was standing with his hand on the doorknob. He turned and pushed it open.
Inside was dark, no lights whatsoever. I blinked a couple times, trying to get my eyes to adjust. Thomas ran his hand along the wall, feeling for a light switch. A horrible smell then hit me and I physically stopped as if I had walked into a wall. I knew that smell. Minho had frozen at my side as well, his arm shooting out and stopping Thomas from moving another step. My heart was pounding in my chest, smashing against my ribs like a bird desperate to escape its cage.
"What is it?" Thomas asked, just as his fingers found the light switch. Light flooded the space and I held my hand out to block my eyes for a second. But Minho had seen it and was yanking us back violently.
"Run, run!" He yelled and took off down the hallway. Thomas was by his side, his hand like a vice around my wrist as he dragged me along. I glanced back to see the slimy, stinking form of a griever lumbering out of the doorway and smashing into the opposite wall. We pounded down the hall, taking the left turn ahead, and crashed through a closed door. The griever behind us spiked its limbs into the floor and walls with ear piercing scraping sounds. The door brought us to a large gymnasium style room, a high ceiling and linoleum floor. A set of large bleachers sat on the left side of the room and we dove for them. Another door on the far side of the room was the only way out. Just as we ducked under the metal steps, the door where we had entered smashed open and the seething griever squeezed through.
"What now?" Minho panted next to me but Thomas shushed him. The griever was slowly walking around, smelling us out. We tried to sit absolutely motionless. My lungs burned for air but I forced myself to slowly breathe through my nose, my eyes focused on the monster.
"Try to lure it under here." Thomas said so quietly I barely heard him. Minho scoffed lightly and I glanced back at him.
"Bring it to us?" I hissed in disbelief.
"If we trap it under here, we can smash it with the bleachers. The controls are right there." Thomas pointed across the room at a small metal panel in the wall. I looked back at the griever as it grunted, spiked appendages clanking against the slippery flooring.
"Hey ugly!" Minho shouted just then, making my heart leap into my throat. The boy had run out from under the bleachers and was jumping up and down and waving his arms. The griever immediately gave chase and Minho dodged out of the way. Thomas cursed under his breath and pushed me as I scrambled to get out. My shoes squeaked on the linoleum and I nearly tripped on the extra traction it gave me. Thomas was already sprinting towards the control panel. I tore after him. Minho was running back towards the bleachers, the griever scarily close. Ducking under the steps, Minho wove his way through them carefully. Meanwhile, the griever had rammed halfway through the bleachers and swiped at him with its clawed arm.
I reached the control panel with Thomas and he slammed his fist into a bright red button. A loud alarm rang out and the bleachers began to collapse in on themselves. Minho jumped clear but the griever writhed and screeched as its body was crushed.
"Come on!" Thomas yelled, not waiting to see if it had worked. He ran towards the door and yanked it open. Minho ran through just after us and we slammed the door. We were in another hallway, this one lit up more. We ran down it, searching for another door. After nearly a minute, we found one. Minho pushed through it first. This one was a classroom or a laboratory, or both. Black desks with chairs sat lined up in the center, larger desks along both walls, another door to the right. Minho shut the door behind us and locked it, then collapsed into one of the black chairs.
"What are those things doing in here?" He gasped. I lowered myself to the floor and lay out on my back, closing my eyes. My chest heaved as I desperately sucked in huge gasps of air. My heart felt like it was going to explode at any second.
"I don't know." Thomas panted from somewhere to my right. "But notice how there's no people here? Anywhere?"
"I bet the grievers escaped and killed them all." Minho coughed in between breaths.
"Probably."
"You alright down there?" A hand patted my chest lightly and I opened my eyes to look up at Minho. I nodded, still unable to catch my breath. "Haven't run like that in a while, eh?" He cracked a smile and I rolled my eyes, glancing up at Thomas. He was still standing, but leaning his hands onto one of the desks as he looked around the small room.
"If the grievers are roaming around, killed everyone, then it means the maze really is shut down. But then why did the maze collapse when we opened the door?"
"It was probably already programmed to." I grunted as I forced myself up. I leaned my back against the leg of the desk. "We were supposed to have everyone with us when we opened it."
"Do you think they survived?" Minho's voice was quiet and small, worry and regret lacing every word. There was a moment of silence as we refused to answer the question.
"We'll go back for them." Thomas said then, his voice confident. "We can get them out."
"Dude, the way through has a huge piece of granite in the way now."
"We can't leave them behind." I winced, rubbing my ankle as it throbbed. Somehow I had run through my limp, but now I was paying the price.
"Let's just wait till morning," Minho sighed and glanced down at his watch. "It's nearly 9 pm, we should rest."
"Sleep here?" Thomas raised his arms, gesturing to the small room. "With those things running around?"
"You have any other bloody ideas?" I looked up at him, leaning my head against the desk leg. I didn't know how he was still standing. I was exhausted.
Tommy POV
"You have any other bloody ideas?" Newt breathed as he leaned into the desk leg. I met his exhausted gaze and dropped my arms to my sides. Minho was reaching towards me, pointing to my backpack. I slipped it off, accepting defeat. They were right. We wouldn't be able to do much for them tonight.
An hour later we were sitting in the far corner of the room. The food I had in my backpack would have been enough for one person for a day, maybe two. But split up amongst three starving people and it was already gone. It had been enough to take the sharp edge off my hunger, but I knew it would be back within an hour or two.
Newt leaned into the corner, his head resting on the wall with his eyes closed, arms folded across his chest. Minho and I sat on either side of him in a similar position. The silence was a little unnerving. It was only now that I realized that whatever facility we had ended up in didn't have much electricity either. No air conditioners hummed and the lights flickered constantly. The dead silence made my ears ring. I could pick out every little sound, from Newt and Minho's breathing to my own heartbeat. Newt's eyes flickered open and he sighed, folding his legs under himself, shivers running through him.
"You alright?" I asked quietly and gently patted his knee. His clothes were still damp from the slide. His tired eyes met mine and he nodded.
"Why is it so cold?" He muttered.
"Probably because the air conditioner is off, and we're soaked." I looked around the room, spotting several vents in the ceiling. I turned back to him to see he had closed his eyes again.
"Turn off the lights will you, Tommy?" His voice was more a plea than a question. I stood and moved to the light switch by the door. Flicking them off, we were plunged into near total darkness. I felt my way back to them and plopped down next to Newt, shifting so my shoulder leaned into his. He didn't say anything, understanding that body heat was going to get us through the night. I leaned my head against the wall and closed my eyes with a deep sigh.
Alby, Gally, Chuck, Frypan. I could only hope that they were still alive. Only hope that we could reach them tomorrow. Only hope that we could get everyone out.