𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗥𝗨𝗡𝗡𝗘𝗥 𝗚𝗜𝗥𝗟 ᐅ 𝙣𝙚𝙬𝙩

𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗹𝘃𝗲

I pick up the pace, breaking into a run as I emerge a T-junction.

Left or right? Left or right? Left or right?

As if to answer my question, the whirring of a griever rattles from the right, and I dash left, evading its cries.

"Ignore it, Thea," I whisper. "It won't catch you."

I keep going, ignoring the branches leading off from the main path, my footsteps as light as I can make them. Branches lead to dead ends. I need to stick to this corridor. My feet ache already, my boots pounding against the cold, hard floor despite my efforts at silence and stealth as I squint to see through the darkness.

Thats when I hear it. A griever. Not behind me this time... in front of me. I want to give up. To slump against the wall and let fate play out the end of my life.

But I press on, dodging into one of the branches, away from the main corridor, away from the griever's hollers, each step I take pumping more adrenaline through me — a drug that I'm hooked on. I dart faster and faster, ignoring the aching of my legs and the failing of my chest.

I didn't see it before I rounded the corner.

There, scuttling menacingly towards me, is the thing that's haunted my visions and caused me pain. The thing that terrifies me. The thing that Newt barely escaped from. It's huge, black, metallic body towers over me, pain searing through my brain as I stare up at its mangled, robotic face. A griever.

Run for your life.

And I do.

Petrified tears prick at my eyes as I run, merging with the beads of sweat dripping down my face as the griever gets closer and closer, it's shrill calls rattling through my body, pushing me forward. Run. Run. Run. My legs are screaming, aching for rest, yet I press on, the griever still hot on my tail.

I dart from corridor to corridor, desperately trying to remember where I've been. There's no use in surviving if I've got no clue how to get back. The sounds of the griever are getting further and further away now but I don't slow down... these creatures are mechanic. Smart. They know this maze like their own brains.

I'm different. I've got no clue where I'm going or what I'm doing.

I like my odds, I think dryly.

I run for a few more minutes, heading the opposite way to where any griever sounds echo. The maze looks to have different levels, shorter walls dividing what should be an easily navigated path into a complex jigsaw. I approach a vine-covered wall and my eyes dart up it, desperately trying to find somewhere to climb.

That's when a rock obscures my running pattern and I fall, my head smashing against the cold floor.

My head spinning with a splintering pain, fear courses through me. It's dark. It hurts to think, to move. That's when the scuttles of another griever haunts the air. My head shoots up, searching desperately for somewhere I could possibly hide. I roll on my side, pressing my back against the stone wall as vines fall over me, concealing me from the fast approaching claws grinding into the floor. I still my breathing as the spikes of it's legs scrape past me, my lungs protesting, gasping for air as I watch the griever exit my view front the vines, waiting a few more seconds as I allow myself to breathe — a shuddering breath in an attempt at silence.

I can't stay here. I'm not covered properly and more grievers will only come closer... there's no way I can stay hidden from them forever.

Shimmying myself out of my hiding space, I survey my surroundings, desperately trying to remember where I came from, and where on earth I could go next. I stumble on a rock, my hands reaching for anything to stop my fall. They grasp onto the vines on the wall, which stay firm. I raise my eyebrows as an idea forms in my head.

I tug on the strands before scaling the wall, the sounds of grievers approaching hurrying me as I desperately move higher and higher, stepping up onto the top of the wall. This wall is the smallest of the ones around me, and only took me a minute or so to climb, but I'm still very visible to any griever that should roll by. Another wall towers in front of me as I try not to retch at the gaps in the walls, displaying the ten metres below me where I just was lying. I scale higher and higher, ignoring the world swaying around me and the pounding of my head. Something hot trickles down my face, dripping a thick red metallic liquid onto the vines that I'm clinging on to and I climb higher and higher, blocking out the griever's deafening whirrs.

It hasn't seen me. Yet.

Once on top of the wall, I realise that I'm now at the level that most of the walls are at, making me sigh in relief. I plonk down on the wall, the space maybe a metre or so, and although I know it's impossible to fall when I have this much space, it doesn't stop my hands from trembling and breath from shaking.

Another griever screams; it's jagged shape appears at the end of the corridor below me, and I throw myself over the edge away from it, grasping onto the wall with my hands, my body dangling above the ground below me. I can still hear it, though unable to see it, and I don't think it senses me, thank the lord. My hands are slipping, the ground below me spinning, blood running down my neck. My breath catches.

I'll fall and I'll die.

A tear mixes with the blood on my face. My hands slip further and further, my fingertips the only thing keeping me alive.

Then the whirring fades. I gasp in relief, reaching out for the rest of the wall, for something to pull me up. I don't think I'm strong enough to hoist myself up. The tears fall faster now as I search for something, anything to save me.

A foothold. I found a foothold. A crack in the wall, just big enough that I can wedge my foot into it and push myself up. And another. Soon, my elbows rest on the top of the wall, and I sigh. One more push.

I use what's left of my energy to hoist myself onto the ledge, collapsing on the wall, the world fading. The last thing I see is deep brown eyes before I'm plunged into darkness.

❀

"Greenie!" A soft voice breathes, ragged and exhausted. Blood is trickling down my face still, puddling next to my head and running down the wall. My head snaps down to meet black hair, tanned skin and a relieved expression.

"Minho?" My voice cracks.

—
Sorry there wasn't much Newt this chapter but I promise I'll make it up to you next chapter ;)

I love Minho so much it's not even funny. Anyway, as always, thank you for each read, comment and vote. It. Means. The. Entire. World. And. More.

~ sophie xx
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