2 Dawn

My feet pound down and up off of the grey cobblestone beneath me. My lungs bend as I push them forward, and my vision blurs but if I stop moving the boys behind me will catch me.

I am surrounded by walls.

Grey walls that are covered in dark green vines. Walls that turn every which way, and as I spin through them I get lost but I don't care. It doesn't matter where I end up, so long as those boys stop chasing me. We planned to escape, that red-head and I, and I'm not going to let that plan go to waste.

It might be ten minutes I've run before I realise I am out of breath, and facing a dead end. My feet back up, looking for a boy behind me, but there are none to be found. They either got lost, or didn't even follow me in here to begin with.

Now, to get out.

I could retrace my steps, but if I do that then I am going to be back in that field, never mind the fact I couldn't retrace my steps if I wanted to. What I need is a way to find out where I am going, but it is difficult to see, and the path is winding around in here.

There are vines on the walls.

Wrapping my hands around the vines, they struggle to keep a tight grip. The first hoist is the hardest, as I rip my feet off the ground and up into the air, using the rocks as hooks for my shoes. I reach another hand up, pulling myself higher, as my muscles burn.

This is difficult, but I need to get to the top. It seems that the walls are as tall as a sky scraper, and I don't know if I can manage to get all the way up but I'll be damned if I don't try.

My feet find their way up the walls for five meters, before my grip slips. A scream escapes my throat as I fall through the air. I hit the ground on my feet first, but they give way to the pressure of my body and I fall on my side. My shoulders shake and my lungs heave as I try to breathe. It's as dark as the elevator now, and I feel like am being sucked into the ground. Screaming doesn't work anymore, as my lungs can't seem to force any air inside them. It feels like I am drowning.

Someone's cold hands are on my neck, and I grip their arms as I try to breathe in and out. Try to swallow air, and try to find out where exactly I am inside my body and my mind. There is a boy in front of me, and he is holding me still. With one move, he lifts my ribs off the ground, and my lungs fill with air.

I cough, and choke on trying to breathe, and my vision begins to return, as I see a boy with soft eyes and dark hair smiling down at me. With his free hand he gestures up and down, in a breathing motion, and his lips move although I do not hear him speak a word.

He holds me still, as my breathing steadies, still kneeling down next to me.

"Are you alright?" He asks, his mouth parts slightly as he finishes the words.

I nod. "Yeah." I cough again, and it rips through me. "I fell."

"You shucking climbed the walls?" He asks.

I shake my head. "Obviously not, or else I wouldn't be on the ground."

He smiles at this, and then his face pales. Letting go of me, he backs away before sitting down on the wall opposite of me. He curls his legs up towards him, leaning his blue shirt against the wall behind him.

I keep myself propped up in between the walls, staring at him.

"What's your name?" He asks.

"Sure have a lot of questions, don't you?" I laugh back.

"You sure don't like to answer them," he shakes his head back and forth. He seems to be out of breath too. "I am not normally this shuckin' nosey, but you aren't 'normally'."

"I'm Dawn." I didn't remember my name until I said it, but now it is out in the open for him to digest.

"Dawn," he repeats the word as he smiles at me. "My name is Minho."

"Minho." I copy his speech pattern. He has a bit of an accent, but so far everyone else here has had the same one as him. Except for that blonde boy who the red-head shoved in the box. He sounded like me, but if I was fancy.

"You talk like Newt," he notices.

I stand up abruptly. "You're from the grassy place."

"The Glade," he stands up like me, moving closer in. "You've been there."

"They were going to lock me up, so I left." I tell him. "You're one of them, aren't you? You're going to bring me back."

"How did you get there?" He demands, his soft curiosity replaced by genuine fear and concern. "When did you get there?"

"An elevator." I am not sure why I'm telling him this. "Only a short while ago."

He pauses, before raking his eyes up and down me. If he doesn't believe me, then I doubt he was sent to come get me. Why is he in here?

I let myself take him in. He wears dark brown pants, and a large belt over his shoulders with various items attached to them. Water, I think, and food in a pouch. He rakes a hand through his dark hair, and it stands up on end as he stares me down.

"You're the shucking Greenie?" He asks. "How did you get in the Maze?"

"I ran." I hadn't realised it was a maze, although it doesn't surprise me.

"You have to come back with me." He tells me. "This maze is dangerous."

I nod. He is going to bring me to those boys, but I can't go back. It is too dangerous.

Waiting for me to move to him so he can take us to the place he lives, I look at him, before tuning and sprinting in the other direction.

"Shuck." I hear him mutter the sound before he comes flying after me.

I don't know how fast he can run, but I hope I can run faster. My feet slide and slip along the cobblestone, and I can hear Minho grunting as he hurries behind me. I turn a corner, and my feet stop as Minho slams into the back of me.

In front of us is a gigantic monstrosity. It's large and dark, and whirs as it moves with gigantic rods and spikes point out of every which side of it. The size of a horse, and with a loud clicking sound erupting from its sides as it moves, it is terrifying.

A hand clamps over my mouth, but I wasn't about to scream, as Minho drags me around the corner.

I squirm from his grip, running in the opposite direction of that monster. As fast as my feet can carry me, I move further and further away from whatever that thing was. I couldn't tell you if it was an animal or a machine, and I don't want to get a close enough look to see the difference.

"That," Minho spits, as he leads me around a bend. "That is what is so shucking dangerous in the maze, slinthead. We call them Grievers."

"I don't care what they are called, I just want to get as bloody far away from them as I can." I tell him, and it's the truth.

"You don't care about what's going on?" He pulls me in the opposite direction I was headed, and though I don't want to go back to the grassy place I let myself follow him.

"No."

I should care, I definitely should. Everything around me is unknown. Where I am, the people I am with, this maze and that monster, as I think about it I don't know anything about my past. That doesn't matter though. What I don't know can hurt me sure, but at this moment I have more relevant things to worry about than knowing. Like, what my next step is.

What am I doing next? I will get to that field, and I find those girls that I came here with. Then, we, I don't know. We don't run back in this maze until I figure out, something.

I don't know what to do.

We get back to the field, and I pause before following him in. A few boys stare at us as we make our way towards the center, and I realise the sun is about to set. I don't know when I got here, nor do I know how long I've been running. It's not like I particularly care anyway.

One of the boys comes up to us, before taking me by the arm and pulling me with him somewhere. He's the one in charge, and they called him Alby. As he grabs my wrist I rip it from his grip, stumbling back into Minho. Minho glances at me out of the corner of his eye, before he also backs away.

"Don't touch me." I glare at the leader.

He rolls his eyes. "You aren't in a position to be telling me what to do, after what you've done. You found her Minho? We have the others."

"Others?" Minho asks, following Alby. His eyes linger on me, gesturing for me to follow them. "I'm gone for like three hours and she ain't the shuckin' weirdest thing to show up?"

"Three girls, they ain't tellin' us their names." Alby spits, as he moves to a door. It's to a large house that boys are building off of. When they see me, a few stop what they are doing. One even goes as far to slip and fall on the planks of wood he is carrying, and I can't help but laugh at that. "What's this one's?"

"If I knew it would I be standing like some such twiddling my thumbs?" Minho has either forgotten my name, or is letting me have it. When he looks to me and winks, I know it is the latter, and I don't know why I'm thankful he is keeping my name a secret.

"I'm Dawn." I tell Alby, following them in the door.

Not pausing as I walk in, I take a chair and sit in it. There is a circle of chairs in the room, each with a boy sitting in one, except for three empty ones, waiting for me, Minho and Alby. I don't want these boys to think I am some weak girl, so if I pretend I own the situation, it can't go poorly.

"Now that the Greenie's here, part two of the meeting can begin." Alby says. "What to do with her."

"With me?" I ask.

Alby rolls his eyes. "Slim it."

I do as he tells me, but I'm not happy about it. All the boys are facing me, mostly unsure of what to do.

"Can you stop talking about me like I'm not here?" I ask. "I'm right here."

"Didn't I tell you to slim it?" He demands. "Listen, you're not part of the council, which means you shut your trap, and you listen, and you wait until I ask you to speak. Got it?"

I scoff. "Unfortunately, yeah."

"So, the Greenbean decided to run in the maze, right? So, what are we going to do?" He continues.

"She's a shank, and a girl greenie." The angry boy, with crazy eyebrows calls out. He has a bruise on his face "She should be spending the night with a griever."

"I am not going near those bloody things." I spit out. "And who exactly are you?"

"I'm a keeper." He answers with pride, as if it means something.

A kid who takes pride in a title. I scoff, rolling my eyes. "Yeah, talk to me when you're relevant."

"Gally, you've already said your piece." Alby scolds the boy, who pouts in a corner like a child. "Let Frypan go."

These aren't just boys, these are children. I really don't want to deal with them, at all. Alby is in charge, and he likes order so I shut my mouth.

The boy, who must be named Frypan nods his head. "The girl's got guts. She managed to outwit every single person in the room."

"I almost tackled her." The angry boy pipes in.

"Did I ask you what you almost did?" The boy, Frypan, continues. "No, I did not."

A few of the boys chuckle.

"She got here and she managed to get out, not knowing any better, after a bunch of guys were staring at her like a meal. And I would know because I serve all you shucks your food. So she ran, don't think should be in any trouble for that. If anything, all you pigs should be in trouble."

"What's your recommendation then, Frypan?" Alby continues.

The boy, Frypan, shrugs. "I guess just to let her walk out and into the field."

Alby nods and points at the next boy. "What about you Winston?"

"Punish her. Don't mean to be rude, but I think she should spend at least one night in the cell. It's only fair. She didn't know she was breaking a rule, but if she doesn't get punish, what example does that set?" The boy says.

It keeps going on like this, three more boys agree with Frypan, and two agree with Winston. I'm thankful the boy who talks like me is on my side, even though we did shove him down on to an elevator. He smiles at me when he says his bit, where most of the others avoid my eyes.

"It's on you Minho." He continues. "You're the split vote, between a night in the cells and lock up until the bonfire for Dawn here."

The boys stiffen as they look to Minho. A few eyes glance to me, as they hear my name. It is the first they have heard. It seems as if I'm the first girl they've ever heard speak, let alone have a name.

Are there no other girls here?

"Bonfire." He quickly fires back, without a second thought. "This one came back with me immediately when I found her, and we almost got eaten by a Griever. I feel like she's been through enough at this point."

"Good that." Alby stands up. "She'll be released with the others."

As quickly as the meeting started it's over. None of the boys talk to me as they filter out, and the boy they call Gally shoves past me. I shrug away from him, not willing to put up with his behaviour. Minho gives me another wink, before heading out as well.

There goes the only one I trusted.

"Here." The one who talks like me steps forward. "They call me Newt. I'll bring you to your friends."

~~~~~~~

I like this. It's fun, and chatty, and exciting. You enjoying it so far? The next chapter will be up tomorrow. So far there is Leo, Dawn (the blonde with the accent), the ginger with the anger, and the young quiet girl. Who speaks next?