Without A Choice // The Maze Runner [Book 1]

TWENTY-THREE

We sprinted through the Maze, staying close together. I felt myself getting out of breath earlier than usual and blamed it on the pregnancy symptoms I had been experiencing for days now. Thomas held up his hand to stop us and he pressed his back against the concrete wall before peering around the corner carefully. 

"Griever?" Chuck asked.

"Yeah." 

"Okay, here's the plan. Chuck, you, Leah and Teresa stay behind and protect this." Minho handed us the cylinder. I nodded at his words and he sent me an encouraging look. 

"The rest of us, we stick together and we get out together. Or we die trying," Thomas said meaningfully. Everyone nodded. "Okay, let's go!" He let out a yell and ran into battle with the rest of us following. The Griever screeched loudly as soon as we entered its view and it ran toward us.

I sprinted past everyone with Chuck and Teresa hot on my heels. The boys all commenced fighting back the Griever and they almost managed to throw it over the edge of the path that led to our possible way out. I'm still saying possible because we never actually found out whether this was the exit or just the entrance to the Grievers' den. If this was the Grievers' den, we were all dead and there wasn't even a point in trying. 

On our way to the door, one of the Griever's legs hit Chuck and he dropped the cylinder. "The key!" he exclaimed and dashed after it. I predicted what was about to happen but I couldn't get my legs to move. Chuck leapt forward to grab the key that was about to fall off the ledge and Teresa was just in time to grab his backpack and pull him back from the black hole.

Two more Grievers came from the depths and I acted quickly, but not quickly enough. One of the Grievers jumped forward and the blade attached to its leg cut my arm. I let out a pained yelp and clasped my hand over the wound.

Chuck grabbed my other arm and dragged me with him as the two Grievers dashed after us. "Thomas!" Chuck shouted as we sped toward the group which had just managed to throw the other Griever back to where it came from. As we sprinted through the group, they held back the two other monsters. 

We ran to the door and as we arrived in front of it, the cylinder bleeped again and the doors slid open to reveal the circle seconds later. "It worked!" I cheered. I turned back to see everyone struggling to keep the spider-like creatures back. More Grievers had come out of hiding and it took the boys all of their strength to keep them away from our group. 

"Leah, go!" Thomas yelled over the loud noises everyone was producing. I nodded shortly and joined Chuck and Teresa in sprinting toward the circle. It was pitch black inside. 

"There has to be something!" I exclaimed and as if on cue, a red keypad appeared and eight numbers popped up. 

"It's a code." I heard Teresa mutter. 

I noticed we had to enter eight digits. "Eight sections of the Maze," I muttered. "Minho, what is the sequence?" I shouted at the Runners' keeper. 

"What?" I received as an answer. 

"The sections of the Maze, what's the sequence?" I repeated.  

Minho was the only one able to remember these kinds of things.

"Seven, one, five, two, six-" He was cut off by a Griever falling on top of him. It must've come from the top of the Maze.

"Minho!" I shouted. Chuck held me back by taking ahold of my not-injured arm. Minho struggled to keep the Griever's teeth away from his head by putting his spear in its beak. Jeff, one of the med-jacks, ran forward and did what no one could've predicted. 

He pierced the Griever's head with his own spear, which resulted in the Griever letting go of Minho, but also led to Jeff sacrificing his own life in return for Minho's.

Someone let out a scream filled with grief but we had no time to pay any attention to it as the Grievers got closer to completing their goal, killing us all. They were cornering us and we didn't have a lot of time left. "Minho, the code!" Chuck yelled.

"Six, four, eight, three!" Minho replied. Teresa entered the rest of the code and the keypad turned green, showing us 'COMPLETE' in big, bold letters. The Grievers started to run toward us but luckily, Thomas managed to throw his spear into the closest one. The doors had started falling down, squashing one Griever after another until the last one was nothing but a heap of limbs and gunk. 

The circular entrance shut within a second and the room turned completely dark. I smelled the piercing scent of Griever entrails and sweat. My hand quickly found Thomas's even without being able to see anything. I would recognize his touch anywhere. 

Only seconds later of being in the pitch black, a steel door opened, revealing a blinding, white light. I squinted as the light hit my eyes and I looked around, seeing everyone was as baffled as I was. I stepped forward and pushed open the door. 

We stepped out of the room and entered a long, dark hallway. One by one, lights flickered on to illuminate the hallway. Thomas stopped me and placed a hand on my lower back. I hadn't realized I was still clenching my heavily bleeding arm. "Let me see that." He removed my hand and I hissed in pain as the cold air hit my open wound.

Newt came up to us and handed Thomas a roll of bandage. "Thanks, Newt," Thomas replied. He carefully wrapped the bandage around my arm, careful not to cut off my blood circulation.

"We gotta get moving," I heard Teresa say. I firmly took Thomas's hand in mine again and kept our fingers intertwined. We took slow steps through the hallway, feeling like we had to walk on our toes so no one would hear us.

The strong scent of metal and sewer water infiltrated my nose, reminding me of something, yet I couldn't put my finger on where I had smelled this before. 

I stopped dead in my tracks as I spotted a door with an EXIT sign above it. I raised an eyebrow but as Thomas moved to open it, I stopped him. "What if it's a trap? It can't be this easy."

He smiled sadly, "There's only one way to find out."

The tension in the hallway was huge as Thomas pushed down the door handle, but it was what was behind the door that shocked us most. Nothing but dead bodies, broken glass and blood. People in white coats were lifelessly lying on the floor with blood spatters scattered around their heads.

I pulled Thomas back by grabbing ahold of his arm and didn't let go. We walked through a white corridor and ended up in a computer room, but most of the screens were either broken or glitching. I let go of Thomas to venture out. The computer screens showed everything, from brain activity to live footage of the Maze and from personal data to-

To an ultrasound.