Disclaimer:

*aggressively screeches lyrics to both '18' by 5 Seconds of Summer and '18' by One Direction at the same time so it's mashed into one song*

-✼-

I had not expected Minho to be upset with us after we came into the Maze. I had not expected him to give up so easily. I, above all, certainly did not expect him to leave us there with a basically-dead Alby and a Griever headed our way.

I was thankful I switched rooms and now bunked with Newt. Then a sickening feeling washed over me as I realized I would probably be staying in Alby's room since it would be empty. Or I wouldn't get back at all and die out there in the Maze.

I wasn't going to let the third option happen. I was going to make it out alive.

But doubt washed over me as the noises grew louder, the haunting sounds ringing in my ears. Then there was a strange scent in the air like something was burning or oily.

Thomas turned toward Alby, who was still laying on the ground where I put him and hadn't moved at all. He cautiously put a hand on his chest to feel his heart. After a second, he nodded, and I sighed in relief. He was still alive.

"Help me," Thomas ordered quietly. I nodded and took one of Alby's arms. Together we lifted him so his arms were around our shoulders and struggled mercilessly to get him to the wall. My calves burned with strain at the dead weight, and with me being several inches shorter than Thomas, the imbalance only made it worse. Our leader's heavy boots dragged uselessly along the ground.

It was too much for even the both of us combined. My legs buckled underneath me and I dropped to my knees while Thomas flew forward on his face. Alby, who was supported unevenly, started to topple to the ground.

We then tried a different approach: grabbing both of his arms and dragging him across the ground. We stopped when we got a bit farther down the corridor, realizing we couldn't possibly carry Alby through the Maze. It wouldn't do us any good if we were all dead.

I felt along the wall until my hand brushed the ivy. From there it tumbled down from the top of the wall in a jumbled sheet of vines. They were much thicker and stronger than I'd imagined, and when I tugged, they barely bent. I tugged again, harder this time. They still held.

"Thomas, what if we got Alby up there?" I suggested in a hushed voice. "We could protect him a bit, at least."

"Are you crazy?" Thomas whisper-shouted. "The vines will break—"

"Just trust me. They're strong enough."

Thomas hesitantly nodded and helped me bring Alby closer to the ivy. He began to rip smaller, thinner strands of vine and made a series of climbing ropes. The gears were turning quickly in his mind. Survival instincts started to kick in, giving him macabre ideas that I didn't suspect he would have thought of without the Griever headed toward us.

I thought things were going all right until a horrible crunching sound made us freeze. I thoroughly searched all three directions of the Maze and saw nothing coming, but the sounds were getting louder and I knew we didn't have much longer until the Griever came.

I instructed Thomas to start working faster and he motioned for me to help. He started wrapping the vines around Alby's left arm while I followed suit with the right one. However, I was extremely bad at tying knots that would stay. Thomas got so frustrated at my failing that he took over, his fingers working quickly yet meticulously as he secured the plants tightly.

"Climb," he commanded, and so I did. Taking hold of one of the stronger branches, I heaved myself upward. The tangles of vines served as handholds and the many cracks in the stone wall were places for my feet. My arms strained, but I brought myself higher.

I looked to my left to see Thomas climbing alongside me. "This is good," he decided once he looked down. We were several feet above Alby. I wrapped a vine around my stomach to keep myself connected to the wall and moved downward. I sighed in relief when the branch held. "Pull him up."

We each took one of the vines connected to Alby's arms and yanked. We couldn't get him more than a couple of inches off the ground— his dead weight was too heavy.

"Maybe we can push him from below," I suggested, my voice barely audible. Luckily, Thomas managed to get the gist of what I was saying and started climbing down. I followed, but he held his finger up to stop me.

"Stay there. I'm going to need your help making sure he's secure once I get him up."

I watched helplessly as Thomas pushed each limb one by one up, tied a new branch around it, then switched to another and repeated. In five minutes he had gotten Alby three feet higher than he was before.

My breath hitched as more clangs from the Grievers sounded. There were red flashes to our left, and I knew now that there was more than one monster headed our way.

"Hurry!" I hissed, and Thomas got back to work, repeating his method of climb, wrap, push, secure until he was getting past me.

"Go," he gasped, his face slick with sweat and his hair stuck to his forehead. "Climb up higher."

I did as I was told and urged myself upward, the task now much easier since I had another branch around my waist. I kept going until I was about thirty feet up and waited patiently for Thomas, who was grunting as his muscles screamed at him to stop. Finally, he reached me and I could tell he couldn't go anymore.

The Grievers' awful noises increased and I heard Thomas gasp from beside me. He opened his mouth to scream, but I slapped my hand over his face to prevent him from doing so. My heart skipped beats, wondering if the Grievers had already arrived.

But when I looked over Thomas's shoulder, I could see it was just a Beetle Blade that was right in his face. If I had not been on the verge of having a panic attack, I would've laughed.

"Thomas, we have to hide," I reminded him, but the boy was staring at the small, metallic bug with such intensity that I moved closer to get a better look at it. It was silver and shiny, with bright red eyes that flashed at my face.

But the thing that caught my attention the most was the eerie word on the bug's body, crimson and strange as if it had been written in blood.

WICKED

I creased my brows and was about to lean closer but Thomas hissed, "Don't move," and I stopped. We waited for long, painful seconds until the horrid thing finally scuttled away.

Thomas's chest heaved. I realized he had been holding his breath.

"What the heck?" I asked as he sputtered from beside me.

"I hoped -" he gasped for breath, "I hoped they only detected -" another breath "-movement."

"You idiot," I scolded in a whisper. "Those bright eyes must've been cameras or something."

Thomas froze as a squeal echoed through the Maze and my voice stuck in the back of my throat. I watched, frozen with fear, as a Griever rounded the corner.

It was too difficult to describe, partly because it looked like a deranged mechanic's experiment gone wrong, and partly because of how deadly it looked— somehow like a slug with hair and slime covering it, metal spikes jutting out from random spots every ten or so seconds. Then it suddenly contracted into a ball and rolled forward, then popped back out. I stared at it in awe and horror as I noticed more and more details.

Metal arms stuck out, each with a different purpose. There were claws, a few had lights, and others had needles ending in a deathly-sharp point. I thought I saw a chainsaw in there somewhere as well.

I didn't dare move even though I was still awkwardly placed over Thomas's back, my head twisted over his shoulder. My body ached uncomfortably from the position and the effort it took to hold me there, but I kept absolutely still, my breathing almost inaudible.

I looked down and discovered with terror that the thing had reached the area where we were. I begged internally that it wouldn't see us.

It rolled right up to the wall that held me, Thomas, and Alby suspended in the ivy. The beams of light shone all over the place like it was having some sort of disco party. And then they went out, and the Griever didn't move.

"Party's over," I muttered, not intending for it to be heard.

"You're an idiot," Thomas replied quietly. I rolled my eyes and elbowed him lightly in the side, positive that the monster below us had shut off.

And then I realized I couldn't see. The last ray of sun had vanished and I had been relying on the strange lights from the Griever to keep myself from being blind. It was pitch black.

Fear could not overcome the pain that was screeching through my body, my arms and legs begging to be relieved from the highly uncomfortable position I was still trapped in. But I still didn't move.

Seconds passed. Minutes. I was biting my lip to keep from crying out in pain.

And then, just as I was about to give up and let the scream be heard, the Griever came back to life, whirring and clicking.

And just as I thought things couldn't possibly get any worse, the Griever began to climb the wall.

"Thomaswehavetogo," I whispered, my words a jumbled mess as I felt nothing but sheer panic strike through my body.

"We can't just—"

"Noleavehimwehavetogonow!" I untangled myself carefully and began to unravel the vine from my torso. I fumbled with the knots and managed to get them undone with shaking hands.

"Sorry, Alby," Thomas mumbled and began to move sideways, away from the Griever.

That was where I was stuck. Alby was between me and Thomas. I had to either climb over him, which would be dangerous and would cause me to fall if I misplaced even a single movement, or go down then around him.

I had no choice but the second option. I dug my foot into a crack below me and brought myself down. Once I was far enough, I started climbing to the side and maneuvered myself around Alby, who hung lifelessly. Being careful not to slip, I followed Thomas across the wall and soon discovered that he wasn't climbing- he was swinging. Vine to vine he moved like some monkey and that explained how he was moving so fast.

I made the mistake of looking back and realized the Griever had altered its original course toward Alby and was now heading for me, the sound of crunching rock now added to the mix of awful noises emitting from it.

OhGodI'mgoingtodieMinhowasrightohGodohGod, I thought, then figured that just sitting there like an idiot wasn't going to do anything. I used Thomas's method and reached for a vine around two feet away from me. Gripping it tightly, I let go and swung, then kept going until I was almost matching Thomas's pace.

I was moving diagonally downward by slipping my hands down the vines before swinging. I almost hit my head on the stone which caused me to panic and try to jump away, but I forgot I was on a wall, and almost fell. However, I caught myself on a vine before I could.

That had me moving quicker than before, not wanting to let the Griever catch up with me due to my pause.

I was too late.

I didn't see the claw reaching out for me until it was almost directly in front of me. I yelped in surprise and instinctively let go, tumbling to the ground five feet below me.

As I fell, I struggled to try and latch onto the ivy like I had done before. I reached out blindly and desperately, grasping at nothing but air, hands clawing.

And suddenly I hit the ground.

It was an instant of nothing but shock before the pain came in waves. I had managed to land sprawled out so I didn't damage anything directly, but it still hurt, especially with my still-injured head. Agony pulsed through my body; I let out a cry before I could stop myself and realized my mistake far too late. The Griever knew exactly where I was.

I rolled for a few feet and then pushed myself up into a standing position. Nausea made my stomach turn. Thomas had somehow made it down unscathed (or so it seemed) and kicked out with his right leg at the moment when the Griever tried to grab at us. A loud crack revealed a small victory, but then it dawned on me that Thomas was now landing right on top of the creature.

I darted forward and grabbed him mid-air, squeezing my arms around his waist and jerking us back so we landed backward on the Maze floor. I scrambled to my feet and took off running as the mess of mechanics charged forward at us. Thomas was right alongside me, his long legs making it easier for him to run, and despite my lack of height, I was able to move pretty fast. Or maybe it was just the adrenaline pumping through me because I didn't want to die.

Thomas let out a loud shout of pain but I didn't look back, noting that I could still hear his footsteps — though rather jumpy — were still just slightly behind me.

We rounded a corner, then another, knowing not where we were going but hoping it wouldn't lead us to a dead end. I sprinted as fast as I possibly could even though my body begged me to stop, my breath ragged and uneven as sweat dripped into my eyes and I squinted to see through my slightly swirling vision. My head throbbed with every slam of my feet against the Maze floor. Warm blood dripped down my elbows, which I must have scraped when I'd fallen.

Right. Left. Down a long corridor, then right again. Left. Right. Two lefts in a row. Another long corridor. The sounds of the Griever tumbling along behind us didn't fade, but we weren't losing ground, either and maintained a steady balance between gaining and losing.

A stitch in my side made it nearly impossible to breathe and my heart felt like it would pop. I knew I wouldn't be able to go much further. Maybe I could just fight and get it over with.

We rounded the next corner — a right — and skidded to a stop at the sight in front of us, hearts tripping to keep up with the exertion we were putting our bodies through.

Three Grievers were waiting, rolling along and coming directly toward us.

We were trapped.

gif is thominho

--

hihihihi!!

this is three chapters of tmr smashed into one. woohoo!! (they were hella short so i decided to combine them)

i hope you liked this chapter!

dedicated to @5secondsofash bc her comment on the last chapter was great omg

~kristyn