LIMERENCE ﹐ the maze runner.

28

"Thomas, wake up!"Clara rambled as she frantically tried to shake Thomas awake. "Thomas! Thomas, wake up! Wake up!"

Clara stopped when she saw Thomas's eyes blink open. "What now?"he muttered as he sat up sleepily.

"The sky, Tom!"Clara said so softly it was almost a whisper, but Thomas could hear the panic in her voice. "Look at the sky. The sun... it's, it's... gone."

"Wait, what?"Thomas asked as he sprang up from the bed and walked away from it, followed closely by Clara. Thomas opened the door and stepped out as Clara pointed up at the sky.

She was right. Every inch of the sky was a plain grey colour, with no sun shining. "Oh my God,"Thomas mumbled to himself. "The Sun just can't disappear. I mean, it can't do that."

"Well, if it didn't disappear, then what the fuck happened to it?"Clara shouted and looked over at Thomas.

Was this what the voice had meant? Last night, before Clara fell asleep.

Tom, I just triggered the Ending.

"Hey, Thomas, Clara!" Clara turned her head and saw Archie running over to them. Clara started a quick jog and met him half way.

"What the hell happened?"Clara whispered in a panic to her best friend. "Where is the fucking Sun?"

"I don't know,"he whispered back. "This is bad. Terrible, actually."

"Yeah. If there's no Sun, we can't grow any crops. Then the animals will all die. And before you know it, all of us will to. Unless we can find a way out of this fucking Maze, which I doubt is going to happen anytime soon."

Clara glanced back at Thomas, who was running up to them. Once he made it to where they were standing."How do you think this happened?"

"I don't know. The only reasonable explanation - this must be all fake. Otherwise, how could it disappear?"Thomas answered in a hushed whisper.

"That would make sense,"Clara whispered back in reply. "I mean, huge gigantic fucking Mazes aren't natural, are they? Neither is the Box."

"Or the Grievers,"Archie added. "Holy fuck. Has our lives been a lie all this time?"

"Oh my God,"Clara said. "Here comes Chuck. Thomas, don't tell him what we were discussing. I don't want him to have to worry about it."

"Got it,"Thomas replied.

"Okay, I'll see you in a minute, Tom," Clara said, gave Thomas a quick kiss on the cheek. "I'm gonna go find Minho. We need to get the fuck out of this hell hole if we want to live."

❀✿❀

Clara had never really liked running. She had never quite seen the appeal of getting all hot and sweaty while it felt like your insides were burning up. But now, she realized why people were Runners. It wasn't for the fun of it.

It was for survival. They were doing it to find a way to escape.

Now, she saw it more than ever. The Sun was gone, and the inevitable truth was that all of them would die unless they got out.

But what if the world outside was no better than the Glade?

She pushed the thought out of her mind and looked over at Thomas, who was running next to her. Minho, naturally, was a few feet ahead of the both of them.

Minho rounded a corner to the right, when he slammed to a stop, his eyes almost skidding out from under him. He jumped back and put his arms out to stop Clara and Thomas.