Maze Runner

He exaggerated a salute, feeling a rush of adrenaline, as he knew he’d just crossed a line.

He groaned in frustration; his echo amplified through the air, like the haunted moan of death.

Harsh sounds of chains and pulleys, like the workings of an ancient steel factory, echoed through the room, bouncing off the walls with a hollow, tinny whine.

He squinted, maybe anticipating Thomas’s question.

Thomas was so stunned he’d barely heard the last part.

Thomas suddenly felt dizzy, his eyes flickering between the boys and the bizarre place in which he’d found himself.

As he breathed in deeply, trying to settle his nerves, a mixture of smells bombarded him.

He pictured snow on trees, running down a leaf-strewn road, eating a hamburger, the moon casting a pale glow on a grassy meadow, swimming in a lake, a busy city square with hundreds of people bustling about their business.

His hair was blond and cut long, cascading over his T-shirt.

Thomas hesitated, then stepped into it with his right foot and clutched the rope as he was yanked toward the sky.

Another corner of the compound held gardens— from where he was standing Thomas recognized corn, tomato plants, fruit trees.

He was consumed with curiosity but still felt too ill to look closely at his surroundings.

A tall kid with blond hair and a square jaw sniffed at him, his face devoid of expression.

An odd, dilapidated wooden building near one of the corners of the square contrasted greatly with the gray stone.

Different emotions battled for dominance in his mind and heart.

The words had a heavy weight of dread to them, and he suddenly wasn’t so sure he wanted to know what Chuck was talking about.

They stood in a vast courtyard several times the size of a football field, surrounded by four enormous walls made of gray stone and covered in spots with thick ivy.

A short, pudgy boy fidgeted back and forth on his feet, looking up at Thomas with wide eyes.

Flickering fluorescent lights shone from the ceiling.

Thomas fumed, wanted to punch somebody.

A few trees surrounded it, their roots like gnarled hands digging into the rock floor for food.

A heavy grating sound revealed double sliding doors being forced open.

He groaned in frustration; his echo amplified through the air, like the haunted moan of death.

A group of boys milled around outside, glancing anxiously at the upper windows as if expecting a hideous beast to leap out in an explosion of glass and wood.

With a groan and then a clonk, the rising room halted; the sudden change jolted Thomas from his huddled position and threw him across the hard floor.

The room continued its ascent, swaying; Thomas grew immune to the ceaseless rattling of the chains that pulled him upward.

Trusting his instincts, he knew he’d been moving for roughly half an hour.

Like a book completely intact but missing one word in every dozen, making it a miserable and confusing read.

With another jolt, the room jerked upward like an old lift in a mine shaft.

Most of the kids wandered away then, each one giving Thomas a lingering look before they walked off.

At that moment, Thomas realized with a sickening lurch that he had no idea how old he was.

Thomas didn’t like the malicious way the boy had said the word.

For some reason the clothing here surprised Thomas; it seemed like everyone should be wearing something more menacing— like prison garb.

He peered back at Thomas, hatred furrowing his brow and crinkling his monstrous nose.

Panic swelled inside him once again, almost too much to bear.

Newt had barely finished his sentence when a sudden, piercing scream ripped through the air.

Blue eyes shone through an otherwise pitiful face, flabby and flushed.

His mind functioned without flaw, trying to calculate his surroundings and predicament.

Tears threatened again to fill his eyes, but he refused to let them come.

He scrambled to his feet and walked around the tree, craning his neck for a sign of whatever he’d heard, but he saw only bare branches, gray and brown, forking out like skeleton fingers— and looking just as alive.

With another jolt, the room jerked upward like an old lift in a mine shaft.

High and shrill, the barely human shriek echoed across the stone courtyard; every kid in sight turned to look toward the source.

Metal ground against metal; a lurching shudder shook the floor beneath him.

He didn’t sound comfortable saying the last word, as if he hadn’t quite grasped the slang of the Glade.

“Griever got ya wettin’ yourself?” the boy said through a sneer.

The bully snickered, a short burst of laughter mixed with a phlegm-filled snort.

I have no idea who you are, and I couldn’t care less,” he spat.

As he rotated in a slow circle, the other kids snickered and stared; some reached out and poked him with a finger.

A surge of heat pulsed through Thomas’s veins.

He began his new life standing up, surrounded by cold darkness and stale, dusty air.

Strangely enough, he felt his fear whisked away like a swarm of gnats caught in the wind, replaced by an intense curiosity.

There had to be at least fifty of them, their clothes smudged and sweaty as if they’d been hard at work, all shapes and sizes and races, their hair of varying lengths.

His breath escaped just enough for Thomas to get a whiff, reminding him of some horrible memory that was just out of reach.

A storm of emotions wrenched his gut, twisted and pulled; he wanted to scream, cry, throw up.

A twisted, pale figure writhing in agony, chest bare and hideous.