Part Two, Chapter Two

She's sitting out there on the sand, right in the middle of the beach, all huddled up. For a moment, in the dark she could be a stone, but then she moves, turns her head and stares directly at me. I realise then that she's almost bald, her hair cropped close to her skull. The grey overalls she wears are so baggy she could as well be a boy.

We meet each other's gaze for a moment. The girl is shaking slightly, but her gaze is intent. I feel as if she's staring right through my chest. And then the moment breaks and she pushes herself to her feet and stumbles off up the beach.

"Wait . . ." I call, but she doesn't even pause. I glance up towards my house; from where I stand on the waterfront it's only a short walk away up the trailing staircases that climb the hill. The windows are all unlit. Once again, I don't suppose anyone has missed me. I hitch my school bag up onto my shoulder and set off after the girl.

I catch up with her pretty quickly. I'm walking along the concrete boulevard on top of the sea wall. The beach is a sharp drop on my right. Down there, the girl trudges along, head down, slipping occasionally on the wet sand. Up close I see that she's soaking wet, as if she just crawled out of the sea. Her jumpsuit has a dark, dried patch about the shoulder that looks just like a bloodstain.

"Hey," I call, and she stops finally and looks up, blue eyes fixing on mine. Her face is wracked, as though she's been crying recently. Red rimmed eyes and whitened lips. There's something in those eyes, along with the fear: a kind of independence, or a sadness. Something . . .

"Are . . . are you all right?" I ask, as gently as possible.

The girl stares up at me for a long time. "Fine," she says, her voice hoarse, and then she takes off again up the beach, clearly determined to leave me behind. As she goes, I notice that she's walking barefoot.

I keep pace along the top of the sea wall, one hand on the balustrade. In my estimation she looks a long way from fine. "Are you sure you're all right?" I call.

"Leave me alone," spits the girl.

I keep pace anyway. For a minute or two we walk in silence. I'm not sure what to say. Part of me wants to leave her, to just go home. But part of me is thinking of Darren . . . not just because she looks a little bit like him, but because she's lost too, and alone, and all the things I'm afraid Darren might be.

"My name's Laura," I try. But she ignores me and strides furiously on. Desperate, I try: "Are . . . are you hungry?"

Finally, she stops. Glaring up at me, still defiant, she says, "What?"

"You looked starved," I say. "Listen, I live near here. If you want, I can get you some food."

She snorts and kicks at the sand. Her hands are folded protectively across her chest. "I'm not going anywhere with you," she says. "I'm not stupid."

"You don't have to go anywhere. Just wait here; I'll fetch you something to eat. I'll only be a minute. Okay?"

She doesn't say anything, just stares at me warily, but in a way that seems to give consent. I smile at her and hold up a hand to tell her to wait. Then I take off at a jog towards my house.

What, I ask myself calmly, exactly am I doing here? Feeding the homeless? My good deed for the day? It's not like I don't have plenty of things already to worry about in my life. It's just the way she stood there on the beach; that haunted, defiant look in her face. And of course how she reminded me so much of Darren. When I thought of him, I knew right away that I couldn't just ignore her.

Part Two, Chapter One

One minute I'm dreaming and the next Mari's shaking me gently awake. Groggy, I sit up and wipe my eyes, then take stock of my surroundings: I'm lying on a beanbag surrounded by shelves of colourful books. It's the library. I've fallen asleep in the library again.

"You're making a habit of this," says Mari, smiling. I smile back apologetically.

"I know Mari. I'm sorry. I was just so tired. I don't know . . ." But she shushes me, waves away my apology. Mari's the librarian. She must be about sixty, though she looks good for her age, her hair tied back in a neat little ponytail. She's also one of the coolest and kindest people I know.

"We're shut for the day," she says casually. "Come have a coffee with me."

I stand, gather up my coat and book bag and follow her to the front desk. She busies herself pulling out mugs and clicking on the little electric kettle she keeps there. I sit back in one of the swivel chairs and shake my head to try and clear the lingering grogginess.

"You looked like you needed a rest," says Mari. "Is school getting tough on you, finally?"

I laugh. I can't help it. Mari has this affect on me. "No," I say. "Not school. Just family stuff. My mum and dad."

Mari sits down opposite me and presents me with a steaming mug of coffee. I wrap my hands around it and let the wafts of steam wash over my face. It feels good. There's silence for a long minute, but a comfortable silence. Then Mari says, "Come on, let's talk about happy things. Tell me what's been happening since last we met."

And I do. We sit there for almost an hour, finishing our coffees and just talking. Not about Darren or my parents or anything, but about ordinary, stupid stuff. It feels so good, so simple. Like opening a valve on the back of my head and letting all the gloom and the sadness of the last few days drain out. I tell Mari all about my drawings and my classes and then we talk about travelling, about the places she's been and the places she wants to go. About the places I might go one day.

By the time I finish my coffee it's dark outside. I wait while Mari puts down the shutters on the library building, and then we walk down the high street together. At the end, just before we part ways, we stop.

"You all right getting home from here?" she asks. I nod; the streets are peaceful enough at this hour. Mari's looking at me in this strange, searching way. "You know," she says, "everyone goes through this sometime."

"Through what?"

"This," she says. "Feeling bad. It's just your turn right at the moment. You know that, right?"

I'm smiling again. "I know."

"That's what I like to see. You be careful now. And come back and see me soon, yeah?"

We part and I head off towards home. The night is chilly, but I don't feel cold. As a matter of fact I feel better than I have in days. Part of me wishes I could spend all night in the library, reading and talking to Mari.

I head away from the high street and out along the waterfront. There I pause for a moment and look out at the sea. In the dark it seems huge, a void, a glistening expanse of space. I take a few huge gulps of sea-scented air. I stand for a long time, just turning everything over in my head, looking at it from different angles, feeling--for the moment--at peace.

I'm just about to turn and head towards my house, when I glance down at the beach and catch sight of the girl.

Part One, Chapter Twelve

I'm standing at the head of the beach, just staring. Caught unawares by the smell of the sea, by the cold, wet hardness of the air. For the tiniest, most insignificant moment it drives the terror from my head. Exhausted and hurting and scared as I am, all I'm thinking is this: if I have to die, let it be here. Let it be now. Let this be the last thing I see.

But the moment doesn't last.

The chucking noise of the helicopter seems to press down on me like a physical weight, and it's there again, rounding over the tree line like a malignant insect. The spotlight lances down onto the beach, sweeping unstoppably towards me. I don't even have time to move before I'm skewered. Blinded and deafened in one hectic moment. I raise my hands, still bound, to shield myself from the glare. And in that fragment of an instant I have a clear view of the helicopter. A clear view of the man who sits in the gunner's seat.

My breath catches in my throat. I want to scream. To cry. To run far away and hide like a frightened animal. There's no mistaking that man, even at this distance, helmeted and armoured. I've seen him staring down at me too many times before, that careful little smile hovering on his lips. Watching as they tortured me with the casual air of a man just out for dinner.

It's Ingleman. He's smiling. He's raising a gun, and shouting to the pilot to get lower, lower.

Without even thinking, I take off down the beach, running crazily, the sand jumping in plumes behind me. I slip and slide in the sand, fall and roll over and get up. I plunge bodily into the foam. The cold punches me in the stomach and I pull myself through the surf with my manacled arms, kicking like a beached fish until there's nothing below my feet but water. Water sloshing over my head, filling my mouth with salt. I strike out and I don't stop, kicking and digging at the water as much to stay afloat as to get away. And then at last the tide takes me, and I can let myself float. Float until the beach is no longer visible in the dark and the helicopter and Ingleman are nothing more than a pin-bright dot in the sky, and all around me is water and cold and black.

Part One, Chapter Eleven

"I can't," I say. "I . . . I . . ." But the boy grabs my hand and pulls me towards the fence. He makes a stirrup with his hands and nods for me to put my foot in and then heaves me up against the mesh. I grab with my fingers. My plastic shoes scrabble for a hold. My muscles are in agony. The wire is cutting my fingers. I haul myself up all the same, bound hands grabbing clumsily. And somehow I'm at the top of the fence. I drag myself over and teeter for a moment, searching for balance. I drop down off the other side, landing clumsily. My ankle twists and my foot goes instantly numb. I tumble onto my side.

Looking up at the fence I can see the boy now scaling the wire. He gets a hand on the top and then reaches down to pull one of the twin girls up after him. It's then that it happens. More rifle fire. Red mist billows through the fence and the boy's face screws up in pain. Something warm spatters across me. He drops from the fence.

I'm on my feet again, running, injured leg dragging me back. The muscles in it feel weak, as though they've come unstrung. How much longer can I run like this? How much longer can I keep being lucky? Syra's dead. The blonde boy who killed the wardens. The boy we saved. Those twin girls . . . Soon they'll get me too and it will all be for nothing.

I hear shooting from behind me, and the ground nearby jumps, spraying earth. Then I'm in among the trees, in the shadows.  Roots catch at my feet, branches slash at my face. Crashing through wet screens of foliage I run and run and run. The noise of the shouts and the gunfire from the Academy compound is abruptly cut off and I'm fleeing alone with the sounds of my breath, the beat of my heart. The wretched little sobs that come unwanted from my throat.

Then from above there comes the chucking sound of a helicopter rotor. Close and closer, until it sounds like it must surely be right on top of me. A light so bright it's dazzling cuts down through the trees and a voice like God's own booms out across the forest. I don't even hear the words. I'm past hearing things, past thinking, because if I think of anything then I'll think of Syra and the Academy and all the dead children I'm running from, and if I think of that I won't be able to run anymore.

Then suddenly there's no more forest and I find myself running on sand. A beach, the sea before me crawling black as ink. Salt air whistling against my skin. So beautiful and quiet and strange that it doesn't seem real.

Part One, Chapter Ten

There's something that sounds like an explosion behind me, and when I turn to look there are two wardens there, armed with rifles, faces hidden behind masks. A thin stream of smoke is curling from one of the rifle barrels and it takes me an age to put two and two together, but when I turn back to Syra, hoping, desperate, pleading for it not to be true, I see her staggering back from the fence with her hands on her belly. And then a second shot catches her and she topples onto the ground, red spraying out over the earth.

"Lie down," yell the wardens, and I lie down on the ground. Why fight? I'm as much a prisoner now as ever I was. I'm shaking, not just from the exhaustion of the escape but from the knowledge, the sheer and awesome knowledge that they will kill me. They will kill me like they killed Syra . . .

Syra. Syra lying dead not a metre away from me. And all my fault. She stayed to try and help me. If only she'd just turned and run . . . the sorrow of it is painful.

I see their boots approaching, feel the jab of a rifle barrel in the back of my neck. I squeeze my eyes tight shut. This is it, I tell myself, this is the moment.

Two gunshots. Deafeningly loud.

A huge weight slumps down on top of me, pins me to the ground. For a moment I am confused; is this what it feels like to be shot? Is this dying? But then I open my eyes and I realise that it's one of the wardens. He's slumped on top of me, a flowering red wound in the middle of his forehead. The other lies nearby, just as dead.

With a great effort I heave the man off me. He leaves a thick smear of red on my grey overalls. What's happening? Running across the car park towards me is the boy me and Syra freed from the cells. There's a pair of twin girls following behind him, both looking about fifteen and with piercing blue eyes, the stubble of blond hair covering their shaven scalps. All three of them are armed; as I watch the boy drops his pistol and snatches up one of the warden's rifles. He strides forward, grabs my hand and pulls me to my feet.

"Thank you," I manage. He smiles, nods, then jerks his head towards the fence. The girls are covering the car park behind us with their guns, watching for pursuit. The boy doesn't speak, but he mouths the word "go."

Part One, Chapter Nine

Dark-uniformed figures emerge from behind the trucks, from the corners or buildings. Twenty of them at least, between us and the gate. And that's not even thinking about the watchtowers. Syra's tugging on my arm, whispering, cajoling, "Come ON Lynch, we have to GO," and I'm just staring at the blond kid lying face down on the concrete. What if that's me in just a few minutes time?

There's a shout. The concrete by my foot explodes upwards, and I'm running. Running with death only a second away. Syra plunges on ahead, down the side of the prison building and into a smaller courtyard between it and a workshop on the far side. Briefly, we're obscured from the wardens by the gate by the corner of the building. There's a door; we shoulder our way inside and we're running down a sterile white corridor with offices on either side. The alarm is going off here too. A man in a  white coat emerges from his office and I raise the gun and fire. The wall explodes into shards of plastic and dust and the man disappears, slamming his door.

Left. Right. Another pair of double doors and we're outside again. A shout from our left and I turn and raise the gun and start to fire. I crush the trigger until the thing clicks empty; at the end of the alley we have emerged into a warden crumples. Two others dart back into cover.

"This way." I can hear the panic in Syra's voice. We're rabbits in a run here; all the exits blocked, but running all the same.

We leave the alley and we're in what looks like a car park. Ordinary, civilian-looking cars stopped in neat rows. Two temporary huts at the far end, like you might see on building sites. My legs are jelly from the running, muscles broken and screaming. Don't let them give up on me now.

"The fence," Syra yells, and she's dragging me towards the head of the car park . . . and she's right. There's the fence, and on the other side nothing but the tall, dark shapes of pine trees. We sprint for it, passing in and out of the glow from the light posts. Weaving through the cars. The closer it gets the more imposingly tall that wire fence seems.

And then we're up against it, and Syra leaps up and grabs onto the mesh with her fingertips. She swarms up, over in a second, and down the other side. Watching her, my heart sinks. I can't do it. There's no way. I can barely even run anymore, and this fence is three times my height.

I'm on my knees. I'm clinging to the fence and Syra's fingers are touching mine through the mesh and this is all that separates us. This and a world.

Part One, Chapter Eight

 Syra freezes up when she sees the body of the warden, but only for a moment. This strange look passes across her face, of fear and understanding and resolution, and the next moment she's back with me, all business.

"Let me have the card," she says. I hand it over without question and she runs to the next cell down and swipes the door open. Inside a young dark-skinned boy of about eleven or twelve is sitting up on his bunk, staring at us with terrified eyes. Syra throws the card at him. "Get up," she shouts. "Start opening the cells." For a moment he doesn't move, and Syra yells at him, "Now!" And then he's on his feet, card in hand, a resolute look in his eyes.

Syra grabs my hand and we take off down the corridor. I'm holding the gun in front of me, ready to shoot, ready to kill if need be. When we reach the door at the end of the corridor we don't even pause. I enter the junction room with the gun up, heart thudding, arms braced, teeth gritted, Syra by my side. But the wardens on the platform are already dead, lying slumped on their sides.

"Come on." Syra steers me across the room towards the door at the opposite end. The door through which none of us has ever stepped, which leads not to the labs or the observation rooms or other cells but outside. As we run through into a long, blank corridor I feel a current of fresh air on my face. It is the most beautiful thing I've ever felt.

The door at the end of the corridor is close now. Each second I expect to feel the hot sting of a bullet in my back. I'm waiting for our escape to be cut short.

But it's not. And then we're at the big metal door and through it, and for the first time in what feels like years, we're outside. It's night. Above us the sky is a dark and knowing blue, scattered with stars. The air is cool and smells of forest. We're standing in a large concrete yard, hemmed in on three sides by low, bunker-like buildings. A dozen military-looking trucks are parked at the far end of the yard, alongside a chain-link fence. And there's a gate, flanked by watchtowers.

I see all this in a second, my heart close to overflowing with fear and panic and hope. And then I see that in the middle of the yard stands the blond boy. He's sheltering himself behind a stand of barrels and cylinders. He's shouting something and waving the gun. Not far off from him lie the bodies of three more wardens.

This scene only lasts a moment. Before me or Syra can move, there is the slam and whine of gunfire, and the blond boy crumples violently to the ground.