The Maze Runner: Acadia

Chapter Five

      The girl awoke with a start, a sharp gasp accompanying her unpleasant awakening. She groaned and brought a hand to her hair. What a mess. She started to sit up, but her body began to swing back and forth. She loses her balance a bit, but she manages not to fall. Wait, how did she get here? Her eyes widen and dart around her body, searching for any difference that showed that something could have happened last night. The only change was that het shoes were taken off. Thank God...

       The first thing she felt was an intense thirst. Then her head started to hurt, her mouth tasted bitter, and her eyes strung too tightly to the back of her head. Her teeth felt weird and junky, and her stomach burned. Her back started to ache in the way that made you want someone to literally jump onto it, cracking it until it went numb. The backs of her knees groaned, and it went all the way to her forehead and to her brain, which had been replaced with what she assumed was pure alchhol to feed her lingering hangover. And lots of needles and pins. That must explain why it hurt to think, she thought. Ouch.  Not only did her eyes feel tightly wound into the base of her skull, but they were nailed there. Hard. Anything louder than the sound of silence violated her pain threshold. As consciousness came around, she began to wish she were dead.

      Then, to add onto the beautiful hangover, her stomach squeezes and twist in pain. Within seconds, the pale, dry grass beneath her is fertilized with the former contents of her stomach.  I'm so weak, not even able to hold...how much did I drink? Two? Three? She thought to herself.

      No, she had to have drank much more than just two or three, those are all the only drinks she remembers. She eventually finds her way to her feet, pursing her lips shut. Stumbling, she tried to make my way to Homestead. The sun has just started to rise over the great walls, and a warm glow lurked across Glade. Upon her journey to Homestead, she came across a small cluster of hammocks and sleeping bags, all empty, except for a few.

      Newt just so happens to be one of those few. Loser. She smiled internally. Hypocrite. She was harshly reminded of that herd of stampeding elephants in her frontal cortex. Unable to wait out the pain, her head falls heavily into the palms of her hands. Her eyes close instinctively, shielding themselves from the piercing light outside.

      " Greenie?" A voice behind the girl startled her. She made a half-hearted attempt to greet the Glader, already knowing who it was.

      "Come on, I can get you something for the hangover." Of course, Alby didn't have a hangover.

      Feeling like her brain was bleeding, and the earth was falling off its axis, she waved Alby away dismissively, "I'm fine."

      The Glader crouched down next to her. It was only then she realized that she was back on the ground.

      The girls stomach begins a series of pirouettes, the remaining contents of her stomach moving in sync with each other until they reached an opening. That opening was her mouth. Onto the ground. Maybe she should be a gardener, with all this fertilizing.

      " You just missed wake up," Alby spoke slowly, displeasure clear in this voice. "You, Newt, and a few others were the only ones who got really drunk. Most weren't slintheads and remembered we still work here."

      Upon hearing that, she responded with a humorless chuckle, her throat desert dry and sandpaper sharp.

      "Shocker," She mumbled sarcastically. The Glader straightened himself out and sighed harshly, and then proceeded to curse under his breath.

      "I see an attitude is still intact," he said, piqued by her response. "You're lucky we let you sleep in. That hammock won't be your permanent bed, either." He continued; his voice leveled out to the point where it sounded like he wasn't obviously judging me.