"C'mon, let's check section 8." Y/N suggest. They'd been walking around the outer ring for a while now trying to decide where to go. Section 8 was open today and was the one they'd explored the least.

"Yeah, sounds good." Minho marked off their route on his map.

"So..." Y/N tilt her head. "Do you mind me asking what happened last night?"

Minho groaned. "Just Alby being a jerk. He still doesn't trust you."

"Can't blame him." Y/N admitted. "I can't say I totally trust myself. What if I got my memories back and it changed things? What if I realized I was sent here to kill you?!"

"Well, I sure hope you've fallen enough in love with me by now that you wouldn't kill me." He jabbed at her side.

"Oh no, I'd definitely kill you." She seemed pretty sure about it.

"Cold, Y/N. That's real cold." He muttered. "If I were in your situation, I'd never come close to even thinking about killing you, even if I found out that was my life mission."

"That's nice." Y/N deflected. She could sense what Minho was trying to get at here, like he'd done a few times before. Part of her felt bad, but she knew the glade wasn't the place for that sort of thing. Not now.

"That's nice? That's all you've gotta say?" He complained.

"No..."

"No? So are you finally going to admit that after all this time you—" Minho ran into Y/N. He'd been walking backwards for some reason, looking at the maze walls all around. Luckily, he caught his balance and tried to catch onto what was going on.

"That's not possible." She whispered.

Then, Minho saw it. An opening in the maze walls. Clear as day and as tall as the maze doors in the glade, the world opened up on the other side. It looked like a desert.

Y/N reached her hand out and grabbed Minho's arm. She squeezed tight. "Are you seeing this?"

He was a little distracted by her hand wrapped around his arm but he certainly saw what she was seeing. "A way out."

The pair carefully walked closer. They felt the sides of the walls. The wall opening was like the maze doors. But, it was thin, maybe only a couple of feet thick. Impossible to break through and couldn't be climbed over if this door wasn't here.

Y/N put her hand in Minho's. She lift them up together and cautiously moved their arms through the opening in the wall. All they felt was wind and heat on their hands. Nothing bad happened.

"I—" Y/N couldn't get any words out. "The—"

"We could leave." Minho panted.

Something about moving their arms through the door must have triggered something. Suddenly, the stone started grinding and the ground beneath them shook. It was closing.

Y/N stepped back a little.

Minho looked to Y/N. She stared at those slowly closing doors with defeat in her eyes.

The girl had always sworn she'd never leave unless everyone was here with them. By her own choice, she wasn't going to be leaving even though the world was right there, just a few feet away.

Standing there though, with her hand in his, Minho decided Y/N deserved more than what was here in the glade. She deserved a real life in the real world, whatever that meant, where she could help people. A place she could use that bright mind of hers. He saw that sadness in her eyes as she watched the outside world slipping through her fingers.

If there was one thing Minho had learned since Y/N showed up, it was that he had to trust his gut. He hated the idea, because how was a feeling anywhere near as reliable as his own head? But right now, everything inside of him was churning, telling him to do the one thing he didn't want to.

Minho caught Y/N off guard. As those doors came dangerously close to closing, he started pushing her. Like a stray cat, she immediately started clawing and Minho and fighting against him with all of her force. But, she was no match for his strength and sheer determination in the moment.

"What are you doing?!" She screamed. "Minho! Stop!"

Her cries were agonizing. Minho's ribcage started collapsing in on itself and his mind was being ripped apart. He knew full well what he was doing and it was the hardest decision he'd ever made. It was the worst thing he'd ever done.

Felling like an absolute fraud and vile human being, Minho shoved the girl. He sent her through the door and into the sand on the other side. So disoriented, she couldn't get up and get back in time.

"You'll either get us out from the other side or I'll find another way." The door slowed as it came closer to shutting but it was too narrow for a body to fit through. He had a hard time keeping his eyes on Y/N, tears streaming down her face as she pound her fists against the stone. He had to hold himself together just a little longer. "I'll see you soon, okay? I—"

The doors shut. Do what has to be done. In the moment, that's all he could keep telling himself.

Y/N fell back. Arms wrapped around her head as she sobbed, crying out yet knowing it wouldn't do any good.

She knew why Minho did what he did. But she didn't want it.

She wanted to be there with him and the rest of her friends. If they were going to get out of the maze, it was supposed to have been together. Now, she didn't know where to go, what to do or who to trust. She only knew her name. Back feeling just as she had the day she showed up in the maze, she was defenceless and lost.

Y/N trusted Minho. There had to be a good reason or something she didn't know. He'd sent her out of the maze because he believed, or knew on some level, that she was needed out there. Whether that be to get them out of the maze from the other side or something else.

Minho bit his hand to stop himself from screaming out. He couldn't make a sound incase Y/N somehow managed to hear him. His gut told him he'd done the right thing but the rest of his body felt cold and like he was about to turn to stone. It's like his heart was asking him how he could have commit such an act of betrayal against himself. He already wanted her back so badly. Maybe, he'd just made the biggest mistake of his life, one he'd never be able to take back. He knew he'd never sleep the same until he saw her again.

"Hey!"

Y/N lift herself from the sand and stumbled around, trying to locate where the hollers she'd just heard came from. Was it Minho? Had he gotten out too?

Her heart sank a little when she realized it wasn't him. A couple of people, bodies covered head to toe in cloth, guns in their hands, were clambering out from behind sand dunes hardly a hundred meters away. They hadn't shot her down yet, so she took that as a good sign. On the defensive, she wait for them to approach.

One of the people untraveled the cloth from their hands. Y/N wasn't exactly sure why. Maybe to prove they were human? "Hey, you alright?"

"I—" Y/N felt like her mind was shutting down entirely. Physically, yeah, she was okay. On every other level? She was having a difficult time holding herself together. "Who are you?"

The pair of people exchanged glances. They seemed to come to a silent agreement. "We're the Right Arm. We're a resistance against the scumbags who put you in the maze."

Y/N narrowed her eyes and tilt her head. "Can you help me get everyone else out?"

"Not right now." The taller one shook their head. "We need to get out of here before they get to us."

"They?" Y/N started following the people. It seemed they were here only and best chance of staying a live right now. There was no one—nothing else out here for as far as she could see.

"WICKED." One of the people finally unravelled the cloth from their face as they got further away from the maze.

Y/N looked back with wide eyes to the massive stone walls. "The creators."

"A bit of a kind name for the people who sent you into a death trap with no memories." The girl, who's face Y/N could now make out, snarled.

"That's the thing though," Y/N finally looked away from the maze. These people and what they knew were what she had to focus on now. "I don't think I was sent into the maze by the creators."

"Wanna...elaborate?" The second girl held out some water to Y/N.

"I didn't wake up in the centre of the maze, the glade, in the box like everyone else." Y/N paused to go back and explain what the glade and box was, but the girls seemed to know. So, she carried on. "I woke up in one of the outer sections of the maze. I had a picture of one of the boys and a voice in my head saying 'you need to find him.'"

The girls enhanced frantic glances. "Do you think—"

"Y/N?" The one girl looked Y/N dead in the eyes, searching for some kind of honest answer.

"Yeah...that's me?" Y/N raised a brow.

"I'm Harriet." The girl finally held a hand out to Y/N. "This is Sonya."

"Where's your partner?" Harriet asked.

"Minho?" Y/N questioned. Harriet and Sonya nodded. "He's still in there."

Silence washed over the group. "What's going on?"

"The Right Arm needs the both of you."

"Why?"

The second Y/N asked, sirens on the outside of the maze starting blaring. People started filing out of the maze walls like ants. They were looking for her.

"No time to explain right now. But we have to hope your partner and friends find a way out of the maze on their own soon. At least our plan to get the two of you out half worked."