Chào các bạn! Vì nhiều lý do từ nay Truyen2U chính thức đổi tên là Truyen247.Pro. Mong các bạn tiếp tục ủng hộ truy cập tên miền mới này nhé! Mãi yêu... ♥

{3.3}

Disclaimer:

Gally: *pulls out gun*

Me: *mike wazowski voice* PUT THAT THING BACK WHERE IT CAME FROM OR SO HELP ME

-✼-

So many things had happened during my short time at the Glade, but I was not prepared for the sun to disappear.

I awoke to someone shaking me and I groaned, my heavy eyelids lifting and revealing a worried-looking Newt. I blinked to clear my vision, confused that it wasn't Minho waking me up. One glance at my watch told me it was an hour passed when he got us up yesterday, and my eyebrows creased.

"Dylan, get up," Newt urged with a worried tone to his voice. I sat up and glanced out the window upon noticing that the room was still slightly dark.

The sky outside the Homestead was not the usual pale light of morning, but instead a dull gray. Immediately I slid out of my bed, the rough wood cold on my bare feet as I pressed my face against the glass and searched for the sun.

"Is this a joke?" I demanded once I had pulled away from the window, still staring at the colorless sky with an almost angry expression. "You literally cannot just take away the sun. That's impossible."

Newt nodded. "I know. Every shank in the Glade is goin' whack trying to figure out what's happening." He sighed, looking tired and stressed, blond hair unkempt and clothes severely wrinkled. "Get dressed and meet me outside. I don't need you runnin' off on me, too."

He left, closing the door softly behind him. I heard his footsteps echo down the hall and eventually fade as he went down the stairs. I continued to look outside, eyes squinted in suspicion. Then I yanked the fraying curtains closed and began undressing, thinking hard about the sunless sky all the while. As I pulled a blue shirt over my head and paired it with a thin hoodie — it didn't seem like I'd be running that day — it occurred to me that I should probably talk to Thomas. Maybe that girl, Teresa, had something to do with it.

It was just a guess, but after all, the girl had talked to him in his mind. All signs pointed to freaky.

I kept my hair down, too confused to feel like doing anything with it. Flinging the door open, I ran down the hallway while still trying to pull my socks onto my feet and stubbing my toe on loose nails more times than I could count. I reached the stairs and jammed my feet into my own pair of sneakers as I went down them.

I found Newt waiting just outside the Homestead like he'd promised, squinting up at the sky. I jogged to him, head whipping around to view the commotion driving the whole Glade mad.

"Stay away from the others," Newt advised, eyes still on the sky as if he was trying to force the sun back. "They're goin' bloody insane."

"Well yeah, the largest body in the solar system just disappeared into thin air," I said sarcastically as Newt lowered his head to look at me. "That tends to scare people a little bit."

My eyes swept around again, trying to find Thomas. Most of the Gladers had abandoned their sleeping bags where they laid on the ground and gathered around the Box, pointing at the sky. Numerous voices sounded in the distance, mostly shouts of alarm.

Newt was saying something to me, but I wasn't listening. I was too busy searching through the thick crowd a short distance away for my brother.

And then I spotted him. Like the rest, he was craning his neck to view the blank sky in confusion, and I could sense the gears whirring in that excellent brain of his.

Abandoning Newt and ignoring his shouts of protest, I ran across the grass to Thomas who was mouthing what he was thinking, lips moving in the slightest and his face fully concentrated on figuring out what could possibly have happened.

"Artificial," he blurted as I slowed to a stop in front of him. The shouts were a lot louder now that we were feet from the hoard of worried Gladers, so I took my brother's wrist and dragged him further away.

"What?" I asked, the word he had said not making sense to me.

Thomas's puzzled brown eyes shifted to me. "It's obvious, isn't it? The sun can't just disappear. You can't remove it from the sky. It's fake. The sky isn't real."

The plausible guess he had passed onto me made sense. It was impossible to just delete the sun, but why would the sky be fake?

And it clicked. "You're right. Oh my God." I ran my fingers through my hair, thinking deeper into the possibility. "Think about it- when's the last time it rained?"

Thomas's eyes went wide. "Okay, but how on earth did a fake sun shine down on these people for two years, providing them heat and light and what they needed to survive?"

I shrugged, my mind filling with more theories to add to ours. "I don't know, Thomas. I'm no scientist."

Chuck found us, a look of pure terror on his pale, chubby face. "What do you think happened? Looks like a big gray ceiling— close enough you could almost touch it."

His stare was also glued to the sky, and Thomas and I turned in sync to follow his gaze.

"You better not try to, Chuck," I joked, trying to lighten the situation.

"Yeah, makes you wonder about this place," Thomas mused, his voice quiet. "Maybe something's broken. I mean, maybe it'll be back."

Chuck stopped gawking and shared glances between my brother and I. "Broken? What's that supposed to mean?"

Thomas didn't answer, and I didn't want to say what I was thinking now that we had a worried kid on our hands. If what Thomas told Chuck was true, why take away the sun only to give it back? What was the purpose?

"Thomas? Dylan?" Chuck tapped us on our forearms and I snapped out of it.

"Yeah, Chuck?" I needed to tell Alby about what Thomas and I had figured out.

"What'd Thomas mean by broken?"

"Oh," Thomas said, a faraway look in his eyes. "I don't know. Must be things about this place we don't understand. But you can't just make the sun disappear from space. Plus, there's still enough light to see by, as faint as it is. Where's that coming from?"

His words only seemed to worry Chuck more, the boy's jaw slacking in astonishment. "Yeah, where is it coming from? What's going on?"

"Chuck." I grabbed his shoulders and looked right into his frightened eyes, a very serious tone to my voice. "Listen to me, okay? Everything is going to be fine. This is just another bump in the road. Alby and Newt will figure this out, and we'll all be fine. You got that? I won't let anything happen to you. Promise."

Chuck stared at me for a second, and I couldn't tell what he was thinking or why he wasn't reacting. But soon I felt his arms go around me and he pulled me to him, wrapping me in a tight hug that I didn't hesitate to return.

"Thank you." There was so much gratitude in the small boy's voice that it made my eyes sting.

"You're welcome."

He slowly released me, and Thomas was watching us with a small sort of smile. He nodded to Chuck, a soft look on his face which contrasted greatly to the one of pure confusion from a few minutes ago.

"Wonder Twins!" Minho ran up to us. "Quit your leisure time with Chucky here and let's get going. We're already late."

My bad mood plummeted further. I had thought that the atrocity would have set off normal activities, including work. Besides, I was nowhere near ready.

"You're still going out there?" Chuck asked, just as surprised as we were.

"Of course we are, shank," Minho said with a roll of his eyes. "Don't you have some Sloppin' to do?" Anger boiled in me as he looked from Chuck to us. "If anything, gives us even more reason to get our butts out there. If the sun's really gone, won't be long before plants and animals drop dead, too. I think the desperation level just went up a notch."

With a start, I realized Minho was completely right— about the animals and plants dying, that was. The sun, fake or not, was the prime source of life for everything. Without it, we were goners.

Thomas's voice filled with dread as he questioned, "You mean we're going to stay out there overnight? Explore the walls a little more closely?"

Minho shook his head and I thanked my lucky stars. "No, not yet. Maybe soon, though." He looked up to the sky, an unreadable expression on his face. "Man— what a way to wake up. Come on, let's go."

"Wait!" I cried. "I'm nowhere near prepared."

Minho eyed my attire and hair with narrowed eyes before shaking his head. "No time. We have to go now."

I groaned, pulling a hairband off my wrist and tying my hair into the world's messiest ponytail to ever exist. Then I shrugged off the sweatshirt and handed it to Chuck, muttering him quick orders to give it to Newt before catching up with the boys.

Not a word was said as we got ready and ate breakfast faster than the speed of light. Since my backpack was in the Homestead, Thomas was kind enough to pack my lunch, snack, and water bottle in his. Minho looked like he wanted to skin me alive.

As we took off into the Maze, I tried not to think about how much my feet would kill from the absence of my good shoes, and how I deeply despised running.

-/-

Before we could get past the door leading to Section Eight, we saw the Griever.

Minho, naturally, was a few feet ahead of us, Thomas in the middle and I slightly behind. He rounded a corner to the right and immediately slammed to a stop, feet skidding on the ground and almost knocking him down. He jumped back and grabbed Thomas and I by our shirts, pushing us against a wall.

"Shh," he whispered, eyes wide in alarm. "There's a freaking Griever up there."

"What?" I muttered in shock, feeling my heart quicken its pace even more than it already had. Minho shushed me again and slowly released his hold on our clothes, creeping up to the corner. Very cautiously, he leaned forward to take a peek.

Minho's head jerked back and caused me to jump, my heart stopping for a second because I thought something was wrong. "It's just sitting up there— almost like that dead one we saw."

"What do we do?" Thomas asked as quietly as possible while still being heard. My expression most likely mirrored his— mouths open in gapes we couldn't close and eyes wide as saucers. "Is it coming toward us?"

"No, idiot— I just told you it was sitting there."

"Well?" Thomas's hands raised in frustration, but I knew he was probably just terrified. "What do we do?"

"We should turn back," I suggested, my voice barely a whisper. I kept my eyes on Minho, who was still crouched at the corner. "We can't have something happen to one of us."

"No," Minho protested, shaking his head. "We have to keep going, but it's blocking the way to our Section. Let's just watch it a while— if it comes after us, we'll run back to the Glade." He peered around the wall, then looked over his shoulder. "Crap— it's gone! Come on!"

Minho didn't wait for a response and took off running. He didn't notice the expressions of absolute, sheer panic on mine and Thomas's faces. We shared a look and darted after him, though all my instincts were telling me to turn back to the Glade.

Minho slowed to peek around every corner, and each time he did, he whispered that he'd seen the Griever's tail disappear down the next turn.

Something didn't seem right about it. The Griever surely should have heard us following it. It should have sensed the pounding of our feet on the stone ground and our hushed voices. It should have—

Oh my God. It wanted us to follow it.

I stopped so quickly my feet slipped out from under me. Thomas watched where Minho turned before pausing to help me up.

My body was rigid in fear, and I felt like my legs were going to give out. "It wants us to follow it. Thomas, we need to head back."

He shook his head, sweat shining on his face. "We can't. We don't know our way well enough yet." He steadied me on my feet and let go of my arms. "Minho turned to the right. Let's go."

I sighed, trying to ignore every inch of my being that was screaming at me to turn back. I sprinted alongside Thomas and we followed the end of Minho's feet to find our way back to him.

We found ourselves at the passage that led to the Cliff, the three of us staring in shock as the Griever spun right toward the bottomless edge and pitched itself over the Cliff, swallowed by the shadows.

"That settles it," Minho said, with not so much as a tinge of surprise.

We stood on the edge of the Cliff, staring into the gray nothingness that the Griever had just fallen into. There was no sign of it anywhere, not up or down, or left or right.

"Settles what?" I asked, not understanding his words.

"We've seen it three times now," Minho replied, examining the blank wall of gray with a thoughtful expression. "Something's up."

"Yeah," was all Thomas said. Very insightful.

"That dead Griever I found— it ran this way, and we never saw it come back or go deeper into the Maze," Minho further explained. "Then those suckers we tricked into jumping past us."

"Maybe we were the ones being tricked," I muttered, trying to wrap my head around all that was going on.

Minho turned to look at me, contemplating my words. "Hmm. Anyway, then this." He pointed out at the abyss. "Not much doubt anymore— looks like the Grievers can leave the Maze this way. Looks like magic, but so does the sun disappearing."

"If they can leave this way," Thomas added, and I could sense the surge of excitement running through him, "then so can we."

But much to his dismay, Minho only laughed. "There's your death wish again. Wanna hang out with the Grievers, have a sandwich, maybe?"

I rolled my eyes. "I thought it was pretty good." I reached out and poked Minho's side, feeling the hard muscle beneath his shirt. "Got any better ideas, Minho Almighty?"

"One thing at a time, Greenie. Let's get some rocks and test this place out. There has to be some kind of hidden exit."

Together we scrambled around the nooks and crannies of the Maze, gathering as many loose stones as possible. I held about twenty in both arms, craning my neck awkwardly so I could see around them.

Between the three of us, we managed to collect a decent pile, then dumped them near the Cliff. We sat right on the edge with our feet dangling over nothing. I tried to shove down the incredibly dark feeling I had of sitting that close to it, and plopped down between the two boys.

Minho pulled out his paper and pencil, setting them beside him. "All right, we gotta take good notes. And memorize in those shuck heads of yours, too. If there's some kind of optical illusion hiding an exit from this place, I don't wanna be the one who screws up when the first shank tries to jump into it."

"That shank oughtta be Keeper of the Runners," Thomas joked, sounding nervous. "You'd wanna hold on to one beauty of a rope."

I looked at him with a blank expression. "You're not funny."

He shrugged. "Just trying to diffuse the tension..."

I picked up a rock from the pile behind me, holding the dusty thing in my hand and calculating where I wanted to throw it.

"Yeah." Minho started speaking before I had the chance to let go of it. "Okay, let's take turns tossing them, zigzagging back and forth out there. If there's some kind of magical exit, hopefully it'll worm with rocks, too- make them disappear."

Thomas aimed his first rock to the left and hit nothing. Minho tossed his just about a foot farther than Thomas had and also had no luck. I threw mine the opposite way with a grunt, watching as it hurtled far away and fell.

"Shuck, Dylan," Minho said, gaping. "We're not trying out for major league baseball, here."

Ten minutes passed of Minho and Thomas having no luck, while I carefully thought about each throw I made. I had only tossed about three, while the boys were starting to run short on rocks as they zoomed in all directions.

I had a great thought. The boys were stupid. We saw where the Griever exited, so we should throw them right where it left.

Reaching behind me, I slowly picked up a rock and held it, feeling the roughness on my fingers. I turned it over in my hand as my eyes carefully examined the dull nothingness in front of us.

I lifted my arm. I threw the rock about a foot directly in front of me.

And watched it disappear.

My eyes widened in shock, and immediately Minho and Thomas ceased to move, staring at the place where the rock once was in total astonishment. I couldn't get any words out.

"We've thrown stuff off the Cliff before," Minho finally said, voice laced with surprise. "How could we have ever missed that? I never saw anything disappear. Never."

Thomas coughed. "Do it again— maybe we blinked weird or something."

Though I knew that wasn't the case considering I hadn't blinked at all, I still picked up another stone — this one much bigger and more obvious — and chucked it exactly where I had before. My eyes followed it as it sailed outward and then blinked out of existence.

"That is so shucking cool," I muttered under my breath, still staring at the spot in shock. "Go me."

"Maybe you weren't looking carefully other times you threw stuff over," Thomas surmised. "I mean, it should be impossible— sometimes you don't look very hard for things you don't believe will or can happen."

"That was so inspiring," I joked, joy replacing my initial surprise. "Thomas the poet. You can write stories about everyone in the Glade."

Thomas pursed his lips in annoyance and muttered about how we should start calculating the size of the thing. Minho scribbled down entire pages of notes as Thomas and I threw the rest of the rocks, aiming for the exact center and all inches around it. As it would turn out, it was only a few feet square.

"No wonder we missed it." Minho was now drawing a diagram as well as he could, pencil scratching loudly on the paper. "It's kind of small."

"The Grievers must barely fit through that thing," Thomas commented with his eyes fixated on the spot. I did the same, trying to burn it deeply into my memory. "And when they come out, they must balance on the rim of the hole and jump over the empty space to the Cliff edge— it's not that far."

"Yeah," I scoffed, "try fitting scared teenagers into it."

Minho completed his dimensions and stared at the invisible exit. "How's this possible, guys? What're we looking at?"

"Like you said, it's not magic," Thomas said.

"Our sky and this must be connected," I added. "You know, like, illusions. The sun was never really there. The sky is not a sky. This whole place is crazy."

"Yeah, crazy is right. Come on." Minho stood with a grunt and shouldered his backpack. "Better get as much as the Maze run as we can. With our new decorated sky, maybe other weird things happened out there. We'll tell Newt and Alby about this tonight. Don't know how it helps, but at least we know now where the shuck Grievers go."

"And probably where they come from," Thomas said with a final glance at the Cliff. "The Griever Hole."

I snorted. "What a name. One of Thomas the poet's best."

"Shut up."

gif is dylan when the rock disappears

______

I AM DETERMINED TO FINISH THIS STORY BY THE END OF THE YEAR OK THAT IS MY GOAL

also it is sO hard to add detail to these chapters because JDash doesn't describe the things that matter very well siGh

it makes me want to slam my face into a wall.

dedicated to MandilynnnNixcomb because they also read this whole book in one day

~kristyn

Bạn đang đọc truyện trên: Truyen247.Pro