THE HEARTS » TMR [1]

16. Gally

All she could see was darkness. Total darkness. Margaret reached out her hand, shakily, hoping to find someone sitting right beside her, and then she felt the shoulder of someone.

     "Chuck?" Margaret hushed. "Is that you?"

     "Yeah," he replied quietly.

     She breathed a sigh of relief and closed her eyes. If he was alive, it meant that everyone else was too. Margaret drew him in for a tight embrace.

     "Are we dead?" A voice had said in the background. Margaret immediately recognized it as Minho's.

     "You wouldn't have talked then, you bloody shank." Newt.

     Then she heard a grunt on the other side of her.

     "Is everybody okay?" Thomas.

     In the back of her mind, Margaret knew the answer. Half of them had been killed off by the Grievers. Nobody was okay, and they were never going to be themselves again. Margaret's joy at escaping had faded, and she was now in deep mourning for half of the Gladers who had died in the process of escaping, of returning home. It was difficult to call the whole thing a victory.

     After a series of groans and grunts, it was time to go. The metal doors of the Griever's Hole had opened, and there was light. 

     The Gladers began to move their feet, and one by one, they exited the Griever's Hole. And once they were in the light, all of their bruises and scars on their faces and arms were visible. They were tired and weak. The fight with the Grievers had completely drained their energy, and Margaret could tell by the expressions on their faces that they just wanted it to be over so they could sleep like there was no tomorrow.

     "Where do we go?" Minho asked.

     Thomas gestured down the long tunnel, which was lined with pipes on all sides. "The doors open down that way." 

     Margaret could tell by Thomas's expression that they weren't safe yet. As soon as they stepped outside the Griever's Hole, all of the lights turned on and continued to turn on. From where they were all standing, it seemed like a never-ending tunnel.

     "Well, that's not creepy at all," Minho said, his eyebrows raised. 

     "Well, let's go," Teresa said. And without waiting for a response, the girl turned and began walking through the tunnel.

     Minho nodded, motioning the other Gladers past him to follow. 

     Margaret was the last one to follow. Something—a sense of feeling—had held her back. Her spine was tingling, and all she could think about was that something terrible was about to happen. But she ignored it and continued on her way with the others.

     For a long time, no one said anything. It went on like this until they got to the door with the word "exit" written in capital letters on top of it.

     "Seriously?" Frypan said to Winston. 

     Thomas approached the door slowly and opened it hesitantly. What happened next was both disturbing and jaw-dropping.

     Oh, God. 

     The floor was littered with dead bodies. The lights were flickering, and blood was splattered all over the place. Margaret turned pale the moment she saw a man on the floor with his brains blown out. She could only imagine what went wrong, hearing a mix of gunshots and screams coming from the people on the floor. Who could've done this?

     "What happened here?" Winston asked as Minho carefully kicked the dead man's gun away from his grasp.

     Nobody responded to his question. They were just as curious as he was.