Beyond the maze

Chapter 2: Talk it out

The door to the homestead was old. Felix suspected it had never really looked new. it was hard to open at first, so the boys allocated Hugo to smash it open as he was obviously the strongest. Inside, everything was covered in dust. There were ten chairs around a plain, circular table and one chair in the corner. A small light bulb hung from the ceiling, and there were some stairs in the far left corner of the room.

"Perfect!" Theo asserted proudly.

As the remaining boys entered the room Felix saw a mix of emotions on their faces, some blank, some disgusted and some confused.

"Not really" The boy who had introduced himself as Atticus remarked.

"How?"

"Theres only eleven chairs and theres twelve of us." replied Atticus. the tall scruffy boy was clealy very observative, as nobody else had counted the number of boys or chairs in the room by this moment. 

"Someone is going to have to sit on the floor then" Retorted a red haired boy named Jasper. Although Felix immediately took a distaste to the boys brash demeanor and snide tone, he couldnt deny that he was right. The statement was followed by an awkward silence in which every body was looking around and waiting for somebody to volunteer. Felix hated the silence so without thinking he blurted out

"I'll do it" 

Immediately he regretted his descision as he felt everyones eyes staring at him. His face involuntarily turned bright red before he plopped himself down onto the dirty carpet floor. the other 11 boys sat at the chairs quietly and Theo was the one to start the conversation.

"so, to be clear, nobody in this room has all of their memories?"

The room filled with nods of agreement and meek mutterings of "yep" and "that's right" 

"Does anybody remember why we are here?" 

The group made it clear that nobody had a clue.

"Alright so to sum up the situation, none of us remember why wicked put us here and none of us know what to do about it"

At this moment, the red haired boy stood up from his seat and cleared his throat. 

"For those of you who don't know, my name is Jasper, and i think it's pretty clear what we need to do."

Again, Jaspers condescending tone sent a pang of annoyance through Felix. He had only just learned the teenagers name and already could tell they werent going to get along, and he could tell from Theos face that he agreed.

"And what's that?" Hugo piped up.

"We need to find a way out"

"I think we all knew that.." Felix replied quietly

The gathering continued for what felt like days, but was in reality only half an hour. the boys went around the table introducing themselves to the group. They talked and talked about every detail they could remember, and generally, most were the same. None of them remembered who wicked were or why they were there, but they all recalled small details such as the name of the building and the word "Glade". As the gathering slowly evolved into a chorus of several conversations going on at once, Theo and Hugo came to sit next to Felix on the floor. They both started talking immediately but were stopped when Atticus sat down next to the trio. he leaned in towards the centre of the circle they had formed on the ground and said with a curious tone

"Did you guys see the look on that boy Elliott's face during the gathering?"