The First Runner

Whistle While You Work Through the Existential Dread

A few days had passed since the Box dropped off the supplies, and honestly, I was starting to lose my patience.

Not fear — I wasn't scared. Just... annoyed. Irritated in a way that lived just under my skin, like a mosquito bite I couldn't scratch. Every morning I'd wake up with this simmering edge, like the Maze itself was daring me to snap.

And today? Today was no different.

I'd been running the Maze for hours already, tracking patterns, trying to figure out any logic in its winding chaos. I'd been marking walls since day three — scratches with a rock, little arrows pointing the way I came from, tally marks every time I turned a corner. Just something to prove I wasn't going in circles or losing my mind.

So when I turned the corner past the old oak-looking beam — the one I'd nicknamed "Splinter Alley" — and didn't see my usual mark on the left wall, I stopped dead in my tracks.

I blinked.

No scratch.

I walked closer. Ran my fingers along the stone, just to make sure. The surface was smooth — no sign I'd ever carved anything there. But I had. I remembered doing it. I remembered the rock I used. I remembered the noise it made, the little flakes of gray that had crumbled away.

But it was gone.

And now that I was really looking — the whole wall looked... off. Taller, maybe. Angled differently. I backed up, trying to get a better view. Something about the shape of the corridor had changed too. Subtle, but it was there.

I'd heard the sounds every night since I arrived — the deep groaning of stone on stone, always somewhere far away. At first, I'd thought it was just the Maze settling, like some old house with creaky bones. Then I thought maybe it was part of the walls shifting in the wind or something.

But now it clicked.

That wasn't the wind. Wasn't settling.

The shuck Maze was moving.

"You've got to be kidding me," I muttered aloud, throwing my hands up. "Of course you are. Of course you're alive or sentient or cursed or whatever else would make this absolute hellscape even more unlivable."

The silence that followed felt smug.

I spun around, pacing a little. The walls didn't care. They stood there, massive and ancient, like they'd been here for centuries — and were very much enjoying the fact that I hadn't figured them out sooner.

So that was it then. The Maze didn't just trap me — it toyed with me. I was the mouse. It was the bored cat knocking things off shelves just to watch them fall.

Fantastic.

I crouched down, grabbed a piece of chalk I kept in my jacket pocket, and marked the wall again — firmer this time, deeper. I dug the tip into the stone like I was carving a warning. A reminder. "You changed," I whispered under my breath. "I noticed."

And I wasn't going to stop now.

I stood, let out a breath, and glanced down the corridor again.

Let the Maze shift. Let it twist and groan and hide its secrets. I was still here. Still running.

Still stubborn enough to fight back.

Even if no one else was left to see it.

I trudged back into the Glade, dragging my feet like a sulky toddler. My shirt clung to me, drenched in sweat and whatever else I'd picked up from the maze walls. Bark barely even lifted his head when I came into view. He just lay there on the porch of the homestead, tongue lolling out, looking like he had zero intention of moving ever again. Lazy shuck-face.