The Other Side - A Jamilton Fanfiction

Chapter Twenty Three

So there was something to fear.

"Wanna stick together?"

"Is that even a question?"

I smiled, taking comfort in the fact that I didn't have to be alone anymore. "I guess not."

John smiled and started to walked in the opposite direction I had previously been going, pace set steadily.

"Wait!" I called. "Where are you going? I came from there, there's no exit!"

"It's the Labyrinth, Alexander," John said. "It changes. Moves. It's not a normal maze. The only way we'll find the exit is if King George wants us to find the exit. I'm more worried about regrouping, and I'm guessing that's possible sense I found you."

I couldn't argue with that, though there was a pit in my stomach at the revelation that I had been wasting my time. 

I sped up to match his pace, my fingers wrapped around the strange comfort of the blade tucked away in my coat pocket. "So we just wander around?"

"Unless you have a better idea."

So we wandered around for a good long time.

"Are you cold?" I asked him, rubbing at my arms.

"No," he said bluntly. "It's quite humid out actually."

I nodded in disagreement.

"Are you scared?"

"A little bit," he admitted, but by the way his words were clipped and the rough tone to his voice, there was perhaps a bit more fear coursing through his veins than he would let on.

"Okay. Not just me then."

Soon, it felt like we were walking in circles. I kept thinking that I saw the same mark in the ground, the same misplaced stone, the same break in the consistency of the branches, but everything all looked the same.

I was also starting to wonder if I was losing my mind.

Who am I kidding? I was wondering that a long time ago.

But after a while of uneventful walking through a mostly silent maze with the exception of an occasional rustle in the leaves or distant growl, we came across a sudden change in our surroundings.

The gravel path melted away into cobblestone, and the hedges gave into stone walls that looked like they belonged to the ruins of what had probably once been a temple of some sorts.

For a second, I assumed it wasn't real. A hallucination, a mirage in the middle of a maze.

But the moment John stiffened besides me, his breath catching his throat, I knew that it wasn't just a trick of the light.

A tablet sat on a pillar stretching out of the ground in the middle of the ruins, glowing faintly. It was compelling, just like everything else that you should definitely not touch despite it wanting you to.

"C'mon," I said, involuntarily grabbing ahold of his shirt sleeve. "Let's go."

"Are you kidding? No!"

"What do you mean no? That thing just screams danger. We really shouldn't mess with it."

"Okay, on one hand, it could be dangerous and could kill us. But on the other, it has to be better than wandering around without any idea of where we're going or what we're looking for."

"The others—"

"For all we know the others could be dead."

The image of Thomas bleeding out onto the ground, his eyes dull and lifeless, suddenly came to mind. I stepped away from John, letting go of his shirt sleeve.