THE NEXT DAY, EDEN, ALBY AND MINHO stopped to a walk within the maze walls as in her opinion they had been running for far too long. They were nearly there anyhow. The three walked close together, each looking in different directions in order to try and see an approaching Griever before it could attack properly. "I hate this place," Eden shivered, glancing at a particularly discoloured wall of the maze that Minho had just chopped vines from.
"Really? How could you? It's so incredible," Minho replied sarcastically, grin tugging on his lips. She laughed sarcastically, looking up to the clouds above their heads as they walked.
Alby shook his head in some form of disappointment that wouldn't be voiced, "How far to go?"
"Round the corner," Minho replied and they both quickened their steps a little more, just wanting to get there and be over with all these things. When they reached the area, Minho stopped completely. Eden found herself somewhat surprised at the fact that the area just looked like every other place in the maze, drag and majorly concrete.
They each looked around for any sort of signs of anything, a marking on the wall or well, just anything. Eden walked further along than the others, following a thin nearly invisible line of pinkish blood that stopped at a corner. She became transfixed by it, trying to figure out how the Griever sting had caused blood to get on his hands - she could tell it was on his hands due to the markings. She wondered how the maze hadn't changed to be rid of the blood yet.
Her attention was drawn away from the blood via the sound of skin being sliced, an extremely recognisable sound that caused an urge of dread to erupt within her stomach. She turned and found Alby, darkness from the Griever venom, erupting through his shirt while he stared at it in complete shock. Neither she nor Minho moved, not quite knowing what to do. The Griever itself seemed to have disappeared completely. Then, within seconds, Alby sprung into action and started to forcefully attack Minho with the definite intent to harm. She ran across to them and grabbed the nearest thing, Alby's discarded bag and swung it directly to Alby's head with as much force as she could muster. It did the trick, knocking Alby off of Minho so he could get the punch in that knocked him completely unconscious.
They both silently looked at Alby, watching his chest rise and fall with laboured breaths. "How long do we have to get back?" Eden asked at just above a whisper, all sorts of deafening thoughts swirling in her mind.
"Not enough to carry him the whole way," he replied, whispering also. They just stared at the floor, unable to look at each other or Alby. Eden grasped onto the bottom of her shirt and almost wrung it out, wiping away the anxious sweat that had begun to flood her hands with water.
"We have to try, Minho," she whispered back, soon noticing the sweat dripping from Alby's forehead in rejection of the venom already coursing through his veins.
Minho sighed and crouched down next to Alby, hooking one of his arms underneath his, "Grab his arm."
☪
EDEN AND MINHO HAD NOT TAKEN a single break whatsoever, there was no time. They pressed on, half running and half-speed walking whilst they each struggled to hold the unconscious Alby up and off the floor. They had tried and tested multiple methods of carrying him and found that the under-the-arm technique on both sides worked best. Despite the near blinding ache in her shoulders, Eden pressed on and just kept telling herself that if she stopped she would die. It was a pretty good incentive, unsurprisingly.
The gate came into sight and Eden wanted to breathe a sigh of relief, but they weren't quite there yet. She soon noticed how the entire Glade had crowded around the entrance to the maze, awaiting their approach. All of those Gladers cheered once they saw them, thinking that the panicked wait was over. That was until they noticed Alby. Screams and shouts of concern followed now. Eden wiped the sweat from her forehead with her opposite hand and clenched her jaw, "We're not going to make it."
"Yes, we will," Miho pressed, using his last ounce of energy to try and get the four of them across the line quicker. The Maze whirred up, doors closing slowly. They were too far away and from her extremely quick calculations, they were not going to make it. Not a single chance. Not a single Glader ran into the maze to help them, even if some did need to be held back. She was glad to see neither of them going against one of the most important rules within the Glade. She made eye contact with Newt and felt her heart completely shatter at the look on his face.
The doors got closer and closer together, their ounce of will for survival decreasing exponentially. "Eden!" Newt yelled in protest as Fry held him back with a single arm, knowing what he would do to protect her. She continued with Alby - as did Minho - but when the doors got too thin for the three of them to make it through, they all dropped to the ground with exhaustion burning at their muscles as they were both overcome with a sinking gut feeling that would just not eradicate itself.
Eden looked toward the door, to get the last glimpse of home but found her view blocked by an approaching body. Thomas, of course. The maze sealed up completely, all chances for survival leaving along with the scraping clank of metal locking mechanisms.
She could hear distant banging on the walls from the other side and felt her eyes tear up, water spilling from each corner as her chest rose and fell sporadically.
"Congrats," Minho half chuckled breathlessly. "You just killed yourself."
"What?" Thomas asked, all colour draining from his face in an instant. It seemed that his actions' consequences hadn't yet sunken in.
"Why the fuck...would you do that for?" Minho added, still on his knees and attempting to catch the breath that his lungs lacked. Eden was in the same mess, instead sprawled out on the floor and looking at the clouds a voice her head. The only thought in her mind was her death and how it seemed closer now than ever before. No one survived a night in the maze and she seriously doubted that would change now.
Thomas stammered, "I-"
"Look... he's done it now. There's nothing we can do," Eden interrupted his stammering, sighing softly as her voice came out somewhat less breathless than beforehand.
Minho sat down on the floor instead, hugging his knees while he looked around apprehensively. "Survival rate?" he asked, a question directed to Eden instead of Thomas - who gawked at Alby like he was in some sort of glass cage at a zoo.
Eden remained silent for a long time, too long based on the circumstances. "Since there's four of us. Maybe ten per cent," she shrugged, finally sitting up as the oxygen level within her body reached its normal level. "For one of us to survive that is, even less for Alby."
"Hopeful," Minho chuckled with heavy amounts of sarcasm that bordered on irony within his voice. Eden wiped her tears and tucked the fallen, sweat-soaked, strands of hair from her face and forcefully turned her mind straight into survival mode. She would do anything she possibly could to get out of this alive.
☪
THEY, WITH THOMAS, MANAGED TO move Alby a little easier. The three of them had made the decision to tie him up on the wall, high enough that a Griever would not be able to see him, using the vines that littered each surface. It was one of the most difficult things when already swept with such exhaustion but the adrenaline within her body greatly contracted that feeling. She pressed on, helping the others hall Alby's limp body up on the wall. They were just about to tie it off when the clacking of an approaching Greiver echoed in all three of their ears. They all slowly turned in its direction, all combining up with separate plans to survive. Minho dipped, he ran away as fast as he could and she did not blame him for it in the slightest. Thomas helped her find a spot to hide, passing her the strand of Ivy that held Alby up before he ran off too. Eden squished herself into the smallest gap at the bottom of the wall, holding tightly onto the vibes. She watched as the Griever's legs walked past, each tallon joined with a thick needle full of venom.
She remained there for the entire night. Her hand clamped over her mouth when Grievers walked past (and many of them did), while her hands shook but tightly gripped onto the vines. She found herself sweating intently, eyes streaming with tears while she hoped and prayed to something she did not believe in for life.
Twelve hours had never passed so incredibly slowly.
YOU ARE READING
Little lies - NEWT
Fanfiction❝ I just wish you could see the way that I feel about you.❞ ❝ Show me.❞ - EDEN had spent the whole of her life, that she remembered, trying to find something within the chemicals that she was given every month. She had not found anything until a cer...
