Running Scared

We do not rest, or stop to catch our breath, not even to snack on the broken pieces of crackers left in the packet. We must have been lucky, the Enforcer seemed to have chosen to search alone, presuming that two starved members of the Community were pathetic enough for her to deal with single-handedly. She could never have known that we have possession of a weapon or that I wouldn't shy away from stepping between her and Grahame if I had to.

I don't know how much time passes, how long we've been fleeing for, just that my breath turns to desperate panting and a stitch is working its way down my side. I'm not an expert on pregnancy but surely this isn't good for the...the baby, for me to be this exhausted all the time.

Even Grahame is struggling now and I'm deliberating whether I should ask for a break when I hear the most peculiar noise through the trees to our right. It sounds like bubbling, a trickling. It isn't unpleasant.

"What do you think that is?" I whisper to Grahame, trying to see past the tree trunks.

"I don't know, " he tells me, nonplussed. "It sounds like running water."

Together, we creep closer to the noise, breaking out of the cluster of trees to find a sort of opening in the woods. Here, the ground is startlingly green, not like the bristly, scratchy weeds that I'm used to in The Park in the Community. This, I realise, is how grass is intended to look, healthy and lush, almost soft looking.

We stand side by side, staring down at the brook. It gurgles, slipping over its bed of rocks and mud, the bank overgrown and the long grass dipping into the water, waving up at us in a tangle, like spindly fingers reaching out.

"So there is life out here," Grahame finally says in amazement, gingerly kneeling to scoop up a handful of water, letting it trickle through his cupped hands. "Makes you wonder, doesn't it? If they're hiding this, what else have they kept from us?"

I know who he is talking about. Of course I do. Maybe they, the government, gave up seeking out hope long ago, left the memories of a prosperous land where they belonged; in the past, already dead with those who lived through them. Having seen what Grahame and I have up until now, who are we to blame them? If I were still in the Community, if everything since the run had never happened, I would see the forest and shudder. My mind would wander, only briefly, to what lay beyond and it would appear so large and so unknown and so frightening that I would quash the thought until it was dead. We see what they want us to see.

Is there a much bigger picture going on here than just us and the Enforcers, simply life and death? When you have such a position of power, to command a whole nation, the ability to coerce and shape and guide citizens in such a way that you're motives are rendered unquestionable, who would dare stand up against our leader, the woman who preaches of better times ahead and the desire to nurture our lives from the very beginning? The one who promises that these strict laws are there to protect us from ourselves.

When she makes public announcements, our Prime Minister is merely a faceless voice through the intercom. We're small fry, practically nothing to her - she has bigger problems to deal with than a couple of runaways in the middle of her country such as ourselves. Suddenly though, every action and statement comes under scrutiny.

Is this all some elaborate masquerade to keep us quiet, to keep us trained and obedient, just to keep us in our pens where we can be watched without worry? Is this all to stop us from reproducing freely, all to save the world from overcrowding? For the greater good? Is it more than even that? Have we been lied to from the offset? Have they simply taken grains of truth, embedded them deeply within their own schemes, and twisted them so greatly and with such conviction that we had no choice but to believe? We're under constant guard from the day we are born till the day we die, have been fed information from a supposedly trustworthy source of authority and have taken it all on without a second breath. Are we just the result of an overindulgent government who want nothing more than to have total control over all of us?

If this is the case, we have blindly ambled right into their hands, exactly as they knew we would.

"Let's rest here for a little, I don't think I can go on much longer." I tell Grahame, slowly lowering myself to the ground, remembering the scrapes on my knees from when I fell over.

"We can probably afford to, we must have lost them a while back." Grahame says, shrugging off the backpack before pulling at the laces on his boots.

"What are you doing?" I ask, bewildered, craning my neck forward to get a better look.

Grahame yanks off his shoes, then starts to peel away his socks. He gives me a smile, cracking the dried blood and mud on his face. It looks horrendous.

"I'm soaking my feet - they're killing me. I guess I'm not used to walking around so much...or running, even."

He plunges his feet into the brook, only to immediately pull them back out in surprise. His smile turns sheepish.

"It's colder than I thought." he laughs, trying again, wiggling his toes around until they grow accustomed to the temperature. "Not exactly a warm bath but it's the best we're gonna get out here."

I follow suit, scooting to the edge of the bank so that I can dip my toes into the water. I shiver at the contact but it feels good to sit in the grass and soothe my aching feet. It's quiet for a few minutes and I shut my eyes, listening to the birds shooting around above us; all flapping wings and shrill chirping, feeling the breeze kiss my cheeks and stir my hair.

"I've never seen you so, well...content."

My eyes blink open and I glance across at Grahame to find him watching me. I'm already shutting off my open expression when he shakes his head with a small quirk of his lip, a barely there smile, and he reaches for my hand. His fingers, still wet from the brook, wrap around mine.

"It's not a bad thing, Amelia. Quit acting like you're committing a crime by relaxing the creases in your forehead. Your face doesn't have to be in a perpetual frown all the time, you know."

"I don't always frown!"

Grahame chuckles. "You're frowning right now!"

"Huh."

I stare at my knees so he can't see my face. My jeans are still plastered with dirt stains and blood from when I fell, which reminds me...

"Come on, we should clean you up while we have the chance." I tell Grahame, pulling his bag towards me to find a spare piece of material. I make do with an already filthy vest. "I've forgotten what you look like without all that gore covering you."

He releases my hand and holds his own out for the vest but I bat it away impatiently, clicking my tongue.

"You can hardly clean it all off yourself, you can't see where to wipe. I'll just do it, it's easier."

He shrugs and leans back on his elbows as I dunk the vest into the brook, rinsing it through the water until it resembles something vaguely clean. I round on Grahame with it dripping onto the grass, not knowing where to begin.

"What?" he asks, raising an eyebrow. There's a split there and the cut opens up again just from the tiny movement. Blood dribbles into his eye and he has to blink it out.

"Nothing. I just haven't got a clue where to start. There's so much blood everywhere."

He allows himself a lopsided grin and wraps his long fingers around my wrist, moving my hand to the top of his forehead.

"How about here? The lower you go, the more it'll hurt. It feels like I've ran headfirst into a brick wall."

I shake off his grip and get to work, rubbing off the grime as gently as I can. His forehead is easy enough, there's less damage there, but as soon as I dab at the cut on his eyebrow, he hisses through his teeth and flinches away from me.

"Oh, toughen up! Just you wait till I get to your nose, I'm sure it's broken. There's nothing I can do about it though, I'm not a doctor. I think it'll be more crooked than it usually is but it's hard to tell at the minute."

Grahame mutters darkly under his breath, something that sounds suspiciously like 'very funny...' but otherwise, he keeps quiet.

Sure enough, once I wipe his nose clean, it doesn't look as bad as it had but it's certainly swollen and dark bruising is already starting to appear around his eyes. He keeps wincing before I can even lay the material onto his skin.

"If you keep doing that, I might hit you myself." I snap, swatting the hands that he has raised protectively away from his face.

"I can't help it! It's tender! Maybe you should have your nose broken, see how it feels."

I have to keep returning to the water to wash out the vest and it feels as if an age has passed when I finally reach the last of the dirt and blood, at the part of his face where his scar is prominent, if he didn't have the beard covering it up.

"This beard is something else, Grahame. You're losing control of it - I'm serious. It's impossible to get all the dried blood out of it."

He snorts lightly, "I didn't put something to shave with on my list of priorities when I packed. You're just going to have to get used to it."

"Our child is gonna take one look at that beard and freak out - " I begin, catching myself a little too late. Embarrassed, I turn back to the brook and start wringing out the bloodied cloth. It's the first time that I've openly discussed the baby, as if we have a future.

Grahame's voice is so soft I barely hear him.

"I don't think the baby will mind so much, when he sees you there."

I look back curiously, in spite of myself. "He?"

"Or she." Grahame amends. "I don't mind. I sort of have some names picked out, but only if you like - "

"Don't, " I cut in sharply, clenching the vest between my fingers, watching the stained water run down my arms. "I can't hear that. Not yet."

Grahame falls silent and I busy myself with shaking out the vest, laying it out on a rock to dry as best as it can. It's a long while before either of us speak again, and it isn't cheerful.

"We have to find some food, or else I'm afraid we won't last much longer." Grahame sighs, just as my stomach grumbles.

It doesn't seem like a good omen.