Chapter 2 ━━ Being Polite

━━━━━━━━☆★☆━━━━━━━━

A loud clank of metal fills in the air when Sonya pushes the door open and the bright light shines into them. 

Chris helps Vera up to her feet. "Yeah, I know you're a badass who could handle the situation-" 

Vera cuts him off with a tight embrace. "Thank you." 

"This is nice." Chris says, hugging back. 

Vera pulls apart the hug with a playful glare. "Don't take it too seriously, newbie. It was a one-time thing." 

"Yeah. Yeah. Whatever." The boy rolls his eyes with a chuckle as they make it out the door. 

They approach a hallway with pipes running on its walls, going to the end of the hallway. Every remaining Springer is covered in Shade sludge and human blood, their clothes rip to shreds. The count of ten is now down to seven. Sonya, Harriet, Vera, Rachel, Chris and Aris are the survivors of the maze. 

Suddenly, a clicking sound echoes throughout the hallway and lights start to flicker on, one by one lighting the entire hallway to its end. 

They walk through the hallway until they come to meet a metal door at the end. An EXIT sign hangs on the top of it in between two shining green bulbs. 

"Is this some kind of a joke?" Chris asks his eyes on the glowing icon. 

Aris slowly reaches the door handle and shoves it open to give a fair view of the other side. 

They walk into another narrow hallway to notice three guards lying dead on the floor, surrounded by their own blood. 

They pass a room with dead bodies on tables and covered with white sheets. 

"What happened here?" Sonya asks as they pass over a dead guy with a gun in his hand. 

Chris takes his quiver that bears an arrow and the bow off his shoulder and drops it beside the dead guy and picks the gun. "Hope you don't mind, handsome." 

Vera notices this and points at the dead guard. "He's dead." 

Chris removes the magazine to check then opens the cylinder, to find three ammo remaining in it and reloads the pistol. "And your point is?" 

"You were talking to a dead man." She says as they continue to move forward. 

"We traded our weapons." He shrugs, shoving the handgun into his waistband without the holster and hides it under his t-shirt like a pro of weaponry. "I was being polite." 

Vera snorts as they move forward to walk into a large room with screens all over it. 

"They were watching us." Sonya says, looking at a screen that shows the Spring from various angles. "This whole time." 

"They probably had fun watching Aris and Rachel sucking off each other's faces." Chris says smugly, earning a glare from Aris. Rachel is blushing in embarrassment. Others snickers in response as Vera elbows Chris in the gut, choking her laughter. "What?" 

Vera moves to look around when a blonde woman in her early forties appears on the huge screen that is in the middle of the room. The woman looks so familiar to her. But with the loss of her memory, it's hard to catch who it really is. 

"Hello. My name is Doctor Ava Paige. I'm Director of Operations of the World Catastrophe Killzone Department. If you're watching this, that means you have successfully completed the Maze Trials. I wish I could be there in person to congratulate you… But circumstances seem to have prevented it. I'm sure by now, you must all be very confused… angry… frightened. I can only assure you, that everything that's happened to you… everything we've done to you… it was all done for a reason. You won't remember… but the Sun has scorched our world." The woman continues as the screen shows recordings of an orange sun burning down into the earth. "Billions of lives lost to fire... famine… suffering on a global scale. The fallout was unimaginable. What came after was worse. We called it the Flare. A deadly virus that attacks the brain." 

"It is violent… unpredictable… incurable. Or so we thought. In time, a new generation emerged that could survive the virus. Suddenly, there was a reason to hope for a cure. But finding it would not be easy." The screen then switches to different recordings of people who have been infected by the virus and how they're struggling from it. It looks worse than being stung by a Griever. "The young would have to be tested, even sacrificed… inside harsh environments… where their brain activity could be studied. All in an effort to understand… what makes them different… what makes you different. You may not realize it… but you're very important. Unfortunately, your trials have only just begun." 

In the background, people behind the woman panic and run around as another group of men with dark clothes burst into the room and begin to shoot. 

"As you will no doubt soon discover, not everyone agrees with our methods. Progress is slow, people are scared. It may be too late for us… for me… but not for you. The outside world awaits. Remember… Wicked is good." The woman holds a pistol to her head and pulls the trigger. 

Everyone turns their heads away from the screen, not wanting to watch the woman's fate. 

Aris moves away from the monitors as his eyes catch the glimpse of the previous dead lady lying on the floor. 

Everyone follows after him when a large door slides open to its sides a few feet away with an alarm blaring. 

"What's next?" Sonya asks the genius. 

"She said we were important." Chris reminds instead of Aris. 

"Let's get out of here." Aris says and turns to his group. " 

"No." A voice booms behind them. 

They all turn around to see Beth standing by his own, with Chris's bow and the remaining arrow which is pointing at the group. She drops a similar cylinder device they found from the Shade. 

"Beth?" 

"She's been stung." Rachel says, watching the girl. 

"We can't leave." Beth's hands are shaking as her eyes glossy from tears. "There's no escape from this place." 

"Beth. You're not thinking straight. Put your weapons down. We can help you." Aris explains, his hands in surrender. 

"I belong to the maze." Beth shudders. "We all do." 

Chris slowly reaches for his gun and before Beth releases the arrow, he fires thrice, straight into Beth's chest. 

With a gasp, Beth falls to her knees, blood sprouting out of her wounds, then to the ground. 

"That feels damn good." Chris smirks widely at his accomplishment. "I waited for this moment for so long." 

Indeed, Chris never enjoyed the company of Beth since she grew an obsession over him. In Vera's opinion, that might have encouraged the boy to shoot on the girl, not just to protect his brother. It wasn't even once, thrice straight into her heart. The boy is well trained with weapons somehow before the maze. 

Chris notes everyone looking at him with wide eyes. "What? It was self-defense." 

Suddenly, the doors of the tunnel exit open and several men and women dressed in grimy jeans and soaking-wet coats burst through the entrance with guns raised, yelling and screaming words over each other. 

It is impossible to understand what they're saying. Their guns-some are rifles, other

pistols-looks… archaic, rustic. Almost like toys abandoned in the woods for years, recently discovered by the next generation of kids ready to play war. 

Vera stares in shock when a man with blond hair approaches them. His face is young but full of wrinkles around his eyes, as if he spent each day of his life worrying about how to make it to the next. 

"We don't have time to explain." The man says, his voice is as strained as his face. "Just follow me and run like your life depends on it. Because it does." 

With that the man makes a few motions to his companions, then turns and runs out the big glass doors, his gun is held rigidly before him. 

"Go!" one of the rescuers-that was the only way Vera can think of them-scream from behind. 

After the briefest hesitation, the Springers follow, almost stomping each other in their rush to get out of the chamber, as far away from the Shades and the Maze as possible. 

Vera runs down a long hallway, into a dimly lit tunnel. Up a winding flight of stairs. Everything is dark, smells like electronics. Down another hallway. Up more stairs. More hallways. 

On the run, some of the men and women leading from ahead, some yelling encouragement from behind. 

They reach another set of glass doors and go through them into a massive downpour of rain, falling from a black sky. Nothing is visible but dull sparkles flashing off the pounding sheets of water. 

The leader doesn't stop moving until they reach a helicopter and that's when gunfire and cries of agony still rattle the air. "Shit!" 

Vera glances back to find Sonya and Harriet with her like Rachel and the twins are still trapped at the massive door with the latter part of their rescuers, who are firing back at figures wearing black. 

"We can't stay! Get on!" The man screams at the three girls. "Hurry!" 

"We can't leave them!" Sonya complains. 

"You can go back to WICKED if you don't move right now." The man shoves her into the helicopter without waiting for her response. 

Vera looks up into the sky, feeling the water beating against her face-it is warm, almost hot with a weird thickness to it. Oddly, it helps break her out of her funk, snaps her to attention. Then she climbs into the helicopter behind them without a word and takes a seat next to Harriet, leaning against the window. 

She watches the black figures shooting the last member of her current rescuer and taking her friends under their control. Vera begins to feel void. She's helpless and useless at the moment. 

The helicopter rises up, giving a good view of the maze but she decides to close her eyes, not wanting the memories of the maze to bother her anymore. And then, the darkness gets the best of her.