flower | newt ✓

SIXTEEN

chapter sixteen;
oh shit

THALIA FOLLOWED BRENDA THROUGH THE TUNNEL. Which is not a safe thing to do when you just met a stranger for the first time. But for some reason, she felt like she could trust Brenda. So Thalia trusted her feeling and just go with it.

"Do people live here?" Thalia asked, her voice echoing.

"The solar storm forces people underground" Brenda replied. "Jorge says there's settlements all over this tunnels" she added. Thalia nodded and silence fell over them, again. Thalia couldn't stand silence. It made her feel awkward in some way.

"So, Jorge is like your father?" Thalia asked. Brenda shrugged.

"Close enough" she said. "I honestly don't know what he is. He's just always been there. And I've always done whatever he asked me to do, no matter how stupid" she said. Thalia could hear the bitterness in her voice. Thalia nodded.

"That must be nice" Thalia said. Brenda turned to her and furrowed her eyebrows.

"What's nice?"

"To have a father figure in your life" Thalia said. "I never knew my parents. WICKED wiped my memory of them. And even if I do remember, they're probably dead" Thalia laughed bitterly. Her family has been one of the things that sparked Thalia's curiosity ever since she got through the changing in the maze.

In her memory, she has always seen the same two people. A middle aged women, whom she guessed was her mother and a tall man with Thalia's dark brown hair. She has also always seen the same frightening memory of her father on her basement, screaming and trashing all over the floor, dark, black veins sticking out of his skin. An eerie voice behind them snapped Thalia back to reality.

The two girls both turned around and pointed their flashlight at the tunnel, to see nothing but endless pit of darkness. Thalia turned to Brenda and she just shrugged and turned back around, leading the way.

Brenda stopped as she saw three hallways right in front of her. "Damn" she cursed. Brenda turned to the left while Thalia took a look at the right path.

Thalia could see lights at the end of the hallway that she was in. "Hey, I think it's this way" Thalia said. Hearing no response, she turned around and Brenda was not there. "Brenda?" she called out as she walked down the path Brenda supposedly took. "Brenda?" Thalia called out, a little more louder this time.

"Over here" Brenda's voice echoed from her right. Thalia turned and Brenda was shining her flashlight on the walls in front of her. "Look at this" she said. Thalia walked closer to her and she followed Brenda's flashlight. Roots, that's what Thalia guessed, was sticking on the walls and it spread though out the hallways. More and more of it was at the end of the hallway.

"What the hell is this?" Thalia questioned. Brenda shook her head.

"I don't know" she said. Thalia walked deeper into the hallway and shone her flashlight at her surroundings. A squeak sound was heard from their right. They immediately turned to the source. Brenda pointed her flashlight at the small tunnel and Thalia drew her arrow. Thalia sighed as a small rat came out of it. "Jesus" Brenda kicked the rat and it walked away from them.

The rat didn't even reach the end of the hallway when a hand reached for it, and suddenly a creature popped up from the small tunnel and ate the rat. It kind of looks like a crank, but worse than the one Thalia saw when she got out of WICKED. The girls gasp and they both turned to their left when they hear another shriek of the crank.

More cranks started to came out and it didn't took long until they both got surrounded by cranks. Another one came from in front of them and walked towards them, closer and closer. Thalia stood there frozen. Her whole body felt numb. But she unfroze just as the crank was about to come any closer. She took her arrow from her quiver and shot the crank in front of her.

"Go, go, go!" Thalia pushed Brenda to the side to run. Thalia followed the girl as she shot more cranks that followed them from behind. "Holy shit!" Thalia cursed as she shot another arrow at one of the cranks.

"Come on, Thalia!" Brenda yelled. Thalia finally turned her back from the cranks and followed Brenda. Thalia ran, following Brenda who was in front of her.

As they reach the end of the hallway, Brenda stopped her and she later realised why. It was a dead-end. In front of them was an at least two hundred feet drop of free fall. Thalia glanced at Brenda in fear as she could hear the growling of the cranks got louder and louder.

"Shit. What do we do now?!" Thalia asked. Brenda looked at their surroundings as Thalia turned around and shot some arrows at the cranks. Funnily enough, the more cranks she shot, the more of them started to appear. "Brenda! What can we do?!" Thalia yelled.

"Uh.." Brenda looked around at her surroundings. She finally stopped and turned to the girl next to her. "I have an idea and it might be stupid and dangerous" she rambled.

Thalia pulled the bow string and an arrow went through the crank's head, sending them down. "Honestly, at this point, I feel like anything works" Thalia said. She took another arrow and shot it at the crank.

Brenda nodded. "Okay" she breathed out. "Follow me!" she yelled. Thalia glanced at the girl and Brenda was climbing the building. Thalia internally groaned.

"Oh shit"

EDITED
31/05/2019