25/11/12
The Maze Runner by James Dashner
Pages 325-372 (end of book)

1) In this final passage of the book, the Gladers fight for their freedom. This passage starts with the final meal before the Gladers depart for the Griever Hole. The mood was somber, and Thomas was nervous. Newt got everyone gathered, and with a loud battle cry, they all charged down the corridors of the Maze seeking the hole. Thomas found it odd that they do not see any Grievers on their way there, but is horrified when he sees the ten Grievers waiting for him at the Hole. The Gladers stopped dead in their tracks, and wait only to see more Grievers come from the left and right. They were surrounded. Suddenly Alby impulsively ran out to meet the Grievers, thinking that if he is sacrificed, nobody else will die. This is not the case, for after he is mauled to death as the Gladers watch, the Grievers advance. The battle begins, and the Gladers try to make a tunnel or pathway to the hole for Thomas and Teresa to get through. A rough pathway is made, and they run through the madness. Thomas sees Chuck and grabs him, wanting him to survive. They jump through the Griever Hole, and fall into a dark cylindrical hole. They see a computer screen with a keyboard on the opposite side of the room, and rush to it. Teresa begins typing in the code they figured out from the Maps, and Thomas watches her back. Suddenly a Griever fell through the hole, and Thomas battles it. Thomas figures out that you can kill Grievers, because he stabs this one from the top of its body after he rips off its limbs. Teresa calls out to Thomas, because the computer won't let her enter the last word in. Right after, another Griever fell through the hole, but Thomas was distracted by the problem at hand. Just as the Griever is about to kill them, Chuck finds a button under the computer that says PUSH. Teresa presses it, and the Griever behind them just powers down. They wait until other Gladers come through the hole, the numbers half of what they were. Once everyone is through, they follow a tunnel which leads to a slippery slide. Everyone goes down it, and they come out to a room that is lined with computers, with a thin, pale, sick looking scientist at each one. Soon after they come to this room, a woman comes through a door opposite of the Gladers. She comes up to them, followed by a hooded figure. She congratulates the teenagers and tries to calm them down, but they aren't going to take after she takes the hood off of the character next to her. It's Gally. He said a few words, saying that they can control him, and he almost choked himself. His body then relaxed, and he pulled a knife out from his pocket. He quickly threw it at Thomas, but before Thomas could react, Chuck threw himself in front of Thomas, taking the knife in his chest. Thomas couldn't believe it, and after Chuck said his last words to him, Thomas went and beat Gally to unconsciousness, crying uncontrollably. When he got control of himself and returned back to the group, he suddenly heard shouts and cries coming from outside. People with guns came and killed the lady, and told the kids to follow them. They ran and ran, up flights of stairs into the rainy night. There was a bus they had to get to, but Thomas was tackled by a crazed lady saying that he was going to be the cure to the Flare. She was pushed off by one of the rescuers, and Thomas ran to the bus. Everyone took their seats, and the driver drove for a while. A lady on the bus told Thomas and Teresa that what was going on was a long story. There were sun flares that were huge and killed millions instantly and turned tons of land to wasteland. Soon after, a sickness spread that destroyed the ecosystem. There is no cure, and only the richest can be treated. The sickness lives in the brain and consumes the human and destroys their humanity. The Gladers were just part of an experiment to find children who could help beat the Flare. Soon they got to a building that they were ushered into that was a safe-house. They were fed, given beds, and they went to bed, their minds burning with questions.

2) "The sun flares couldn't have been predicted. Sun flares are normal, but these were unprecedented, massive, spiking higher and higher-and once they were noticed, it was only minutes before their heat slammed into Earth. First our satellites were burned out, and thousands died instantly, millions within days, countless miles became wastelands. Then came the sickness."
        She paused, took a breath. "As the ecosystem fell apart, it became impossible to control the sickness-even to keep it in South America. The jungles were gone, but the insects weren't. People call it the Flare now. It's a horrible, horrible thing. Only the richest can be treated, no one can be cured. Unless the rumors from the Andes are true."
        Thomas almost broke his own advice-questions filled his mind. Horror grew in his heart. He sat and listened as the woman continued.
        "As for you, all of you-you're just a few of millions orphaned. They tested thousands, chose you for the big one. The ultimate test. Everything you lived through was calculated and thought through. Catalysts to study your reactions, your brain waves, your thoughts. All in an attempt to find those capable of helping us find a way to beat the Flare."
         She paused again, pulled a string of hair behind her ear. "Most of the physical effects are caused by something else. First the delusions start, then animal instincts begin to overpower the human ones. Finally it consumes them, destroys their humanity. It's all in the brain. The Flare lives in their brains. It is an awful thing. Better to die than catch it" (Dashner 366-367). To me, this quote is the most important of the entire last part of the book. This quote tells the reader, and more importantly the Gladers what is going on in the real world of the book. It turns out that Alby and all those who've went through the Changing were right. The world outside the Glade was not worth going back to. The world is consumed by a sickness caused by sun flares called the Flare. The sickness is supposedly worse than death, and is can't be contained or cured. The Gladers were just part of an experiment to see if the survivors could help defeat the Flare. The rescuers hope that the children will help them. This quote gives clues to the reader about what the next book will be about. You can expect that the children will help the rescuers, and the next book will be based on the finding of a cure to the Flare. The children might even go to the Andes Mountains in South America. There were rumors of a cure there. James Dashner does a good job at leaving this book a cliffhanger.

3) As far as connections to this text go, mine are scarce. If I were to make a distant personal connection to this text, it would be a similarity between Thomas and I. I can understand the pain that he is going through when he loses his best friend, Chuck. Thomas describes it as horrific as losing a brother. My childhood friend, Douglas, didn't die, but he did move away. When he was leaving it felt as though I was losing a part of my family. I was young, and I've gotten over this by now, but I still remember my sadness in the following years after I didn't have my best friend Dougie.