How It All Goes Down
- The Tour starts at the Box, which is closed. Alby explains that they get a new kid once a month and supplies are delivered once a week even though they've become pseudo self-sufficient. Other than that, they don't know anything about where the Box goes or how it operates. Once, they tried to send a Greenie back in it, but the Box wouldn't move until he got out.
- The Glade is divided into four sections: Gardens (where they grow the food), Blood House (where they raise and slaughter the livestock), Homestead (duh), and Deadheads (a place where dreadlocked stoners wear tie-dye and dance to folk rock… just kidding, it's the graveyard hidden in dense woods... good times).
- Thomas will spend the next two weeks training for a different job until they find the one he fits best.
- Throughout the Tour, Thomas is plagued by his inability to ask questions, and he wonders why the people who cleared his memory only did so selectively. Why can he remember what the animals were called, but not where that memory comes from? It's irritating.
- When they reach the South Door, Alby tells Thomas that he's been there for two years, and although many boys have died trying, no one has been able to solve the Maze.
- The walls move at night so it's nearly impossible to map, and more importantly, no one is ever allowed outside the walls except the Runners—on penalty of death if the Grievers don't get you first. Yikes. For some reason this only proves to Thomas that he's destined to be a Runner.
- In another minor concession to our curiosity, Alby also explains that the beetle blades are how the Creators (first time they're mentioned) watch them.
- At that moment, a siren goes off, confusing everyone in the Glade. All the boys are panicked and excited, because it means that they are about to get another Newbie from the Box. What's really strange is that they've never gotten two Newbies in one month, let alone two in two days.