No Such Thing as Dead Ends


Zack was running, again. He sprinted as fast as he could down the long metal corridors of the Maze, his bare feet slapping on the metal ground. He heard the growling sounds echoing off the walls from behind him again. Every second brought the hounds, and death, closer to him. His only hope was to find some way to lose them. But he was almost out of energy; he had been in the Maze for days without food, or water. He came up to a door in the wall and barged through without hesitation. He came into a large dome shaped room, with only one small fire burning in the center. The door snapped shut behind him. He was now trapped in a survival dome, he wouldn't be let out until he either defeated his current obstacle, or died. He knew he stood no chance against the metal hounds. Their sharp teeth would cut his frail eleven year old body to ribbons, so Zack looked frantically around for some sort of weapon, but found none. Sweating from fear Zack moved over to the fire to try to take a burning stick or maybe even find a weapon of some kind, but the fire was in a large rusty steel bowl, too heavy to lift, with nothing but a short tube spitting the fire out. All of a sudden he heard clanking behind him; he rushed to the other side of the bowl and took out his one and only weapon, a metal rod he had taken from the one hound he had managed to kill, and waited.
Two hounds, leaped through the door, their red eyes gleaming dangerously. They charged towards him covering meters in single bounds. Zack swung his rod, but not at the hounds, at the tube spraying out the fire. He hit the tube as hard as he could, bending it towards the hounds. The hounds were quickly smothered in smoke and flames, and started to fall apart, in a few seconds they were nothing but a pile of trash. Zack stood there for a while, listening to the ever present hum that was the sound of the engines of the Slave Barters’ ship, the Zanzibus. It was home, if you could call it that, to thousands of slaves. It was his prison. A door slid open with a whisper behind him. He walked up to it and reentered the Maze. He had survived, for now. He was so hungry he had trouble focusing. His only thoughts were hopes that Viola, his friend, hadn't already been beaten by the Maze.

Viola was dreaming she was running through fields of grass, real grass. Just like the ones they had on planets. Viola laid down on the grass and sighed she felt good, warm almost. She wanted to stay forever, but her head was throbbing, and each time it throbbed, the grass felt harder, and lost its color. Soon the grass was a deluded green-gray and was jabbing at her back like needles.
She woke up with a jerk; she was immobilized in a stun cube, devices that used magnetism to detain objects or people, and hanging upside-down. She had been trapped in a survival dome, and had been captured by Maze Chasers. Kids like her, weak and scrawny had nothing to offer to the Slave Barters but entertainment, and so, were easy prey for the Chasers, large Reptoids entrusted with the task of thinning out the crowd of Maze runners. Viola heard heavy footsteps and closed her eyes like she was asleep. Soon she felt hot breath against her neck, and a three fingered scaly hand jerked her head up to inspect her. Scared, Viola started thrashing again, but once again, to no avail.
“Oh, so we have a feisty one don’t we,” the chaser said in a reptilian voice.
“Oi, don’t touch our profit!” The other chaser shouted.
“I can do whatever I want! I was the one who found it!”
“Yeah, but I was the one who told you where to look!”
Viola cowered wide eyed as the conversation went on to where they would sell her. She was definitely not feeling very good.
Zack was moving again. He limped down the pulsing hallways of the Maze eyes alert for danger. His every sense straining to hear anything that could pose a threat, Zack heard something, only a whisper, but Zack had learned that neglecting even one thing could lead to an instantaneous death, so he cautiously moved closer to the noise. He came to a small space in the floor of the Maze. Which Zack knew was impossible. The Slave Barters that had ordered the creation of this maze had demanded that every inch be visible on gig-screens, small hand held nuclear powered video devices. The only possible reason for this empty space would be a Chaser field. The Chasers used shrouding technology developed by the Slave Barters to help them sneak up on the Maze Runners. The Shrouding Mecs, as they were called, would create a spherical field which would conceal everything within. The only downside to these Shrouding Mecs was that it would also shroud the ground beneath the user. Of course there were more expensive versions that would negate this but the Chasers normally couldn't afford such equipment.

Zack didn't want to endanger his own life, but he certainly wouldn't leave another Maze runner behind. So Zack crept slowly towards the space in the Maze. When he entered the first thing he saw was the still glowing fire cube, that the Chasers had been using to cook with, at the center of the shroud sphere. The second thing he saw was a pile of food sprawled on the ground next to him. The last thing he saw sent chills up his spine. It was Viola. She was crying and looking fearfully up at two especially ugly Reptoids. Zack knew that they were often hired by Slave Barters as Chasers because of their strength, acute sense of smell, and their stupidity. Zack took out his pipe and crept slowly toward the Reptoids.

Viola saw Zack coming up behind the Reptoids but resisted the urge to look at him. Instead, she started bawling, trying to draw the Reptoids attention so that they would be too distracted to smell Zack.

“Shut up!” one of them screamed. The Reptoid started beating her, growling from exertion.

“Stop!” the other yelled. “You’re gonna damage it! If she sells for less I’m gonna ACKH!”
The Reptoid was cut off very suddenly and he fell over onto his partner. Zack lifted up his rod for another swing, but the other Reptoid was already jumping for him. Zack quickly backpedaled but he tripped over the fire cube, burning his ankle and he cried out in pain. The Reptoid slowly started to advance toward him, smiling. Zack tried to crawl away but was paralyzed by fear, and the Reptoid was still coming closer.

Viola groaned, braced herself and lifted herself off the ground. She had been freed from the stun cube when the first Reptoid had fallen on it but now she saw that the second was coming after Zack! She looked around for any way to help, and she saw a pulse splitter! An extremely destructive tool used for blasting open hulls of space ships. Viola snuck slowly over to the pulse splitter leaned down and picked it up. It vibrated and made her arms shake. But she pointed the end she thought made the explosions at the Reptoid and pulled what she thought was the trigger.

There was a huge explosion and Viola was blown back by the recoil. Zack sat still for a moment astonished; then, he got up and helped Viola up. The blast from the pulse splitter had shattered the Maze’s wall. Now, Zack and Viola were looking at a gaping hole.

“Do you know what this means Viola?” Zack asked exited.
“What?”Replied Viola.
“This is our chance for freedom; we have food, a weapon, and finally, a way out. Now all that’s left is for us to take our chance and leave this endless maze forever. Will you come?”
“You know I could never say no to you.” Viola replied. So together they walked through the hole in the wall and into their struggle for freedom.