Burning Curiosity //Minho

Fight or Flight

"Mallory, what are these things?" Thomas demanded. I tried racking my brain. Before I left, there was talk of improving the Grievers. Was this the improvement? I decided to go with.

"Re-improvised Grievers. It has to be. It's what's W.I.C.K.E.D was talking about before I left."

"Before you left?" Harriet demanded.

"I'll explain later. Right now, we need to focus." Thunder crashed overhead.

"That storm won't hold out for long." Raven commented.

"What we should be talking about is how to kill these things!" Silla shouted, gesturing out to the monsters in front of us. They had all removed themselves from the pods and were now ambling towards us. I analyzed them, their spikes, their hands, the orbs, glowing brightly.

"They look like people, maybe just.. stab them." Aris offered.

"Why do they have glowing orbs on their skin?" Ashoka whispered behind me. I snapped my fingers.

"Go for the orbs!" I declared, brandishing my knife and turning around before taking off at a sprint.

"Charge them!" Minho shouted next, understanding. With a roar, everyone began to follow my lead and charge the lightbulb men.

The creature I intercepted, made a swipe at me with their elongated nails and I ducked, smashing in one of the orbs in their legs. The creature screamed in pain, just like a Griever might and I threw my hands up triumphantly. "It worked!" The creature screamed in my face turning around. "Yikes." I ducked again, popping an orb in his arm.

All around me, the creatures were screaming. Glass was flying and people were letting out warlike cries. Being with them, as a unit, felt incredible. It took me ten minutes of ducking, weaving, and shattering of glass to defeat my lightbulb man. Every blow made his lights a little dimmer and seemed to make him sluggish, like the orbs were his power source. When I had finally defeated him, I turned around and tried to pinpoint someone in need of help. A girl screamed and I took off running.

I skidded to a halt in front of a lightbulb man. His back was to me and he was getting ready to pierce Ashoka's chest with his long nails. Swiftly, I punched out a glass orb on his back and then another as he screamed. Lightbulb man whipped around and knocked me to the ground, probably just as he had done to Ashoka. But thankfully, she was quick on her feet and was able to draw his attention by bursting a bulb just as I had done for her. Together, the two of us made quick work of extinguishing his light.

"Thank you." Ashoka breathed out.

"Of course, come on." I held out my hand to her and she took it gratefully as we moved back towards the group. The wind was howling and I could smell the oncoming rain. All around us, lightbulb men were dropping and now, nobody knew what to do. That's when it started to rain. Ashoka and I slid to a stop. All I could think about was flash flooding. I glanced at one of the pods to my left.

"Mallory?" Ashoka questioned. I touched the surface of the pod, letting go of her hand.

"We have to tell the others." I said swiftly. "They need to get into the pods." Ashoka wasted no time in running off to tell everyone. I took off in the other direction, grabbing people as I went. "Get into the pods!" I shoved them towards them, sometimes two at a time. There weren't going to be enough pods for all of us, some would have to share. Suddenly, someone grabbed my arm.

"Follow your own advice." Minho shouted over the the sound of thunder before pulling me towards a pod.

"But the others.." I began.

"Understand what to do." Minho interrupted as I watched Thomas and Teresa push themselves into a pod. I nodded as we ran together to one of the black coffins. Ashoka was just about to get inside. The three of us looked at each other. I shoved Minho in and pulled Ashoka into me before placing my back against Minho's chest. Ashoka shut the door and we were able to see a lightening bolt come crashing down nearby. "Well isn't this cozy." I elbowed Minho.