I do not remember how long that I have been here. Months? Years? Decades of my life? I cannot be quite sure. I guess in the end I suppose it really doesn’t matter.

Although I know that wasn’t necessarily the case either. If nothing really mattered then I would have stopped, I wouldn’t have kept going day after day, despite there being no end. I carried on because deep down…I wanted to live.

I heard the familiar tone of the maze that signified my start. That tone that made my adrenaline spike every time that I heard it. The gates to the great maze flung open and I took off as fast as I could.

It was green on all sides, a good sign.
This maze was the shrubbery, A regular hedgemaze. I was granted a peaceful enough start then. It was a bad day when it started differently, especially when it was the ice. This way my body could focus on the turns without having to worry about exposure to the elements. At least not in the beginning.
They would get here eventually.

I turned sharply to the right, I almost tumbled as I made that first turn, but then began to pick up speed. My body already burned with the adrenaline that coursed freely throughout my veins. I needed to focus if I was going to get through in time. I needed to be ready for obstacles.

I heard them now, out there, in the distance, but never too far. They were closing in. The loud screeching of their claws was almost unbearable as they scraped them into the floor upon which this forsaken maze was built.

I pulled to the left.

I veered quickly and slowed down for a second. I couldn’t hear them if I was going too fast, I suppose it wouldn’t do me any good to know if they were gaining on me, but I found that I needed to hear them. If I couldn’t, that meant something worse was on its way. I heard those strange growls as their feet skittered and they took the same turn.

They had entered the maze by now.

My legs were starting to burn now. I blinked the sweat out from my eyes, I shook the hair from my face. My eyes focused in front of me as I spotted the next turn. I prayed, like I did everytime, that this would be the last time.

Right.

I almost rolled as I took the turn far too hard. My feet slid into what felt like a dense liquid that coated the floor entirely. I felt it splash against my face and noticed it was thicker than water.

I knew what it was, or at least whatever it was that kept me here wanted me to think that it was. The liquid splashed against my feet as I tried to slow down just a little to compensate for its presence. I couldn’t afford to slip now. One more turn just up ahead.

Left.

Again, I took it too fast and rolled into the blood that they had covered the floor with. I tumbled violently, and as I rolled I got a glimpse behind me…but only for a split second.

They were right on me, whatever they were using this time. Their weaponized feet digging into wet ground as the blood splashed up around them. They were using new guardians.

Their bodies were grotesque and misshapen, each limb stretched and contorted as if it was placed there wrong and done so on purpose.
They were a deep obsidian black, they had razor sharp teeth, teeth that were dripping a kind of molten liquid that was clearly volatile. Every drop that fell from their mouth sizzled as it hit the blood on the floor beneath them.

I finished my tumble and instantly fell right back into the run. I had been careless. I have been here. I have done this maze.

They almost had me because a little bit of blood on the floors, I hadn’t been focusing like I should have. Thankfully that was the last turn. I needed to get my head in the game if I was going to survive.

I saw the familiar orange button up ahead, it wasn’t far now. I could feel the ambition of my pursuers. They were close enough now that I could hear the sizzle of their acid like spit dripping against the floor, it was just a little bit further.

I was so close now that I could practically taste it. I dove for it, and at the last second I slammed myself down against the button as I heard the familiar click of my success.

The world shifted instantly, it twisted and turned as I was pulled up into a crimson sky. I let out a howl of pain at the reward for my completed task.

I never had gotten used to the pain my captors put me through. I felt my body being torn apart at the seams like it was a child’s doll. I let out an awful sound as my body was twisted, pulled apart and then reassembled. Blood and cartilage, muscle and bone, shifting wildly in the air before being reassembled.

Then as quickly as it had begun, it came to an end.

I opened my eyes….It never felt any less painful. I never got used to the way that it felt to be pulled apart and then jammed back together like a simple toy.

I moved my neck from side to side and got used to how it felt to be alive again. I lifted one leg and then the other, I felt the familiar feeling of my blood returning throughout my veins.

I walked up to the gate and waited for what came next. I relaxed my mind and let it embrace the blank emptiness of being rearranged. I did find myself hoping for something simpler this time. I didn’t feel like I had the energy to run again, even though I knew that I would if I had to.

I always did.

Then I heard the starting sound. I had never heard this tone before. My ears perked up as the strange sound echoed throughout the chamber. It was a comforting beep that scratched an itch I didn’t know that I even had.

Then the gate opened slowly. That was weird. It never opened slowly. In all my time here… I had never seen it open slowly. It was always flung open. The maze was throwing me for a loop and I didn’t like it.

I walked out into a desolate moonlight night.
I had been here for what felt like an eternity and I had never once seen the sun or the moon or any sign of a peaceful world I had left behind. It was always simply the mazes, day in and day out. Sometimes shrubbery, or walls of stone, even on occasion barricades of ice.

Never the sun, nor the moon.

There was never any sign of nature or life. Nothing besides whatever it was that hunted me. Was this a trap? I felt myself trembling as I walked forward. I did not realize how much I had missed the basic comfort of nature, not until it was there stretched out before me.

I realized as soon a I stepped onto the grass, a shimmering grass that was glistening with dew, that I did not care anymore. I had spent so long running, hiding, fighting. I had forgotten about the way the world had felt before the maze.

The moon shone brightly onto the path before me and against a variety of trees. I made my way wearily into this new and different outside world. It soothed me in ways I forgot that I needed.

The feel of the world was exactly as I recalled before my torment began. It all smelled just how I remembered it once upon a time.
I had grown accustomed to the walls that this place had forced upon me. I had forgotten there was once much more.

I wandered across the grounds of this new place and I realized that this could be another test. My physical abilities had been pushed to their limits, now they were trying to break my mind. They were trying to trick me. To take away the edge that made me what I was…so they could sneak up on me and drag me back.

It was working.

I desperately wanted to be paranoid, to be on my guard. To wait for the sound of any of my pursuers, so that I could either turn and fight for my life or I could bolt… But I could not. I felt at peace in this place and wondered how I could ever go back to the life that I had mere moments ago. I simply did not care anymore.

I then began to panic, they were going to strip me of this. To let me have a small taste of this freedom then throw me right back in. Pull me into the sky, tear me apart, force me back into their twisted games. They were going to rob this peace from me.

I had been walking quickly, my mind scattered and in no way on its guard. I also had not paid attention to which way I was going. It was like the old times before the maze, times when I would wander aimlessly and that was ok. But this was not the old times. This was times of fear. Times of hate. Times of rage.

Then I heard a sound, a familiar sound. One that made my heart skip a beat with excitement. It was a noise that I had not heard in so long that I had forgotten about it entirely. It was the sound of water gently streaming… Fresh water, unlike the recycled waste they let me live off of.

I couldn’t help myself. For too long I had eaten and drank what was allowed to me from behind the gate. Constant waste water and the same bland gruel that barely allowed my body to function under the constant stress I was placed under.

I could smell it now… Actual fresh water. From nature, just as it was intended, as it should be. I would die for it.

I realized that was probably likely as I rushed through the strange forest towards the sound. I wasn’t on any form of guard at all. They had me in their clutches and I knew it. I would have that water though… if it was the last thing that I did.

I came to the edge of the trees and heard the sound just beyond them. It was magnificent. It was rushing ever so slightly, and the scent was indescribable.

I could feel my body begging to taste even a drop. But what if they had poisoned it? Using it as some form of cheap trick. Maybe I would drink one drop of it… then wake up back in the maze. Could I keep fighting? Could I keep running?

Yes. I had done it day after day. This small taste of freedom wouldn’t break me. I would enjoy their deceit, their trickery and I would destroy the thing that was responsible for doing this to me.

But first I would have a drink.

I walked out from the edge of the trees and towards the moonlit bank. I watched leaves falling from overhead and landing gently into the small river below. I walked to it slowly and looked down at my reflection.

I hardly recognized myself. I looked so tired. Exhausted. Beaten. Broken. Thirsty. This place had taken more from me than I could ever have imagined. At least now it offered some kind of reprieve.

At least I thought it had.

That’s when I heard it. It was unmistakable, a sound that I had become familiar with before even my time here, not to mention it being easily distinguishable in the cold silence of the still night. It was the sound of a twig breaking underneath the weight of a predator. There was something behind me.

I turned quickly and ready to scrap. To fight for my life or to die, or perhaps run like never before. As long as it meant not going back to that place.

“Woah, easy now,” said a gentlevoice.

A man stepped forward from the treeline and out into the moonlight. I turned quickly to see if there was another one coming up behind me. To see if anything else was arriving to this trap that had so effectively worked on me.

“Just… relax… I ain’t here to hurt you. I am just a little lost.” he said.

I backed up a foot or so and felt the water against me. It was so cold. I desperately wanted to drink it, to have just a sip.

“I am also very thirsty, if I am being completely honest with you. You happen to be right in front of where I want to be. Not to mention that you are the first living thing I have seen in….quite some time,” he continued speaking, barely stepping forward.

He was moving closer. I wanted to run. But the feel of the water was enough to keep me held in place. I still desperately hoped for a taste. Not to mention now there was something else. An aroma filled the air, one I was barely familiar with, but was tantalizing. It was a smell from before. A kind of food that I had not received since I was young.

I saw a look in the man’s eyes, he must have realized what I was thinking. A flash of remembrance lit up his face as he reached into the pocket of his coat. He produced a small piece of some kind of bread that was the source of the day smell.

He continued walking towards me as he held it out in front of him.

Was I really about to fall for this? I walked forward slowly and carefully. I was scared but it just smelt so good. It had been an eternity since I had any type of food that wasn’t the basic gruel.

He was close now, I was worried and he sensed it. He broke a small piece off before tossing it onto the ground in front of me. It was more than I could handle in that moment.

I rushed forward and devoured the piece whole. I found myself dissapointed in being so greedy that I did not even try and savor it as much as I should have.

There was a soft sound as another piece landed on the ground in front of me. I leapt forward unable to control myself. It was better than anything I had ever eaten, better than I remembered even.

Then the entire small loaf landed on the ground a few more inches in front of me. I rushed forward with absolutely no regard to my safety. It was worth dying for.. being captured for. I was tired of the life that had been given to me all those years. If this bread was my last meal. Well then, I would enjoy every bit of it.

But there was no capture.

There was no fight, no violence to be had here. For the first time in so long I could simply eat. Just enjoy the meal presented by a generous stranger who was kind enough to share.

I felt his fingers gently scratch behind my ear as he kneeled down in front of me and I wolfed down the bread as fast as I could. I didn’t care that he was touching me. I owed him for this pure moment of joy. I hadn’t even heard him approach.

“You look like you have been in this place longer than I have. Look at you, half starved, fur all matted. Honestly you almost smell like you need a bath more than you need that bread.”

He scratched my ears as he spoke. I swallowed the last bit of the bread before looking up at him with eyes that must have betrayed my feelings, because suddenly a look of sorrow came across the man’s face.

“Why don’t we try and find a way out of here together? Just you and me. I suppose you made it all this time on your own, but I sure could use some help.” he spoke quietly, almost as if too himself.

He stood up slowly and made his way to the the gently flowing water then. He kneeled and began to rinse his hands gently. I followed him there and sat by his side. I stared into our reflection upon the moonlit river, it was then that I saw him smile the dumbest grin that I had ever seen.

It was in that moment that I knew that we would find a way out of here. One way or another. I would die for him if I had to, and him for me. It had felt like an eternity or longer since I had a friend, I had no intention of ever letting that feeling go.

My partner.