The dense canopy of trees which stood tall and proud in the forest behind the population control centre did not permit even a single ray of light from the full moon above to penetrate more than a few feet below their highest branches, casting eerie shadows on the debris-covered ground as Tom and Steph sprinted through the thick undergrowth. 

Lightning-sharp bursts of pain shot through Tom’s injured ankle with every step he forced himself to take, and each breath he inhaled made him feel as though he were breathing fire as his lungs burned in protest. Yet still, he pushed himself onward. Hoping against hope that they weren’t being followed. 

Straining his ears, Tom listened intently for any indication that they were not the only people dashing through the forest tonight. Every rustle of leaves had him glancing over his shoulder. Every twig that snapped under their feet, sounding to his ears like a gunshot ringing out through the darkness, caused him to flinch as he imagined scores of Cull Enforcement Agents hot on their heels. Invisible against the inky black sky in their dark suits, their night vision goggles would give them an unfair advantage, as they too, pounded through the thick undergrowth, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Desperate to catch himself and Steph and drag them back to the centre and to their deaths before they could draw enough breath to scream. Alternatively, they might just shoot them. Would he or Steph even hear the bullets as they soared through the night before they crashed into their tired, aching bodies? Would they even realise that their lives were about to end? Or would they just suddenly be snuffed out without warning? Like candles in a stiff breeze, Tom wondered and his blood ran cold despite the hot summer night. 

With one arm tightly secured around her injured rib cage, Steph desperately tried to hold herself together as she fought to keep up with the shadow of the man in front of her. Squinting against the darkness, trying to keep Tom in her sights, she forced her feet to keep propelling her forward even as her muscles screamed at her to stop. She was sure that the only thing keeping her going right now was the adrenaline pumping through her veins, and that if she dared to stop, just for a moment, or even slowed down slightly to catch her breath, she would collapse on the ground and be unable to get up again. 

In an attempt to distract herself from the pain coursing through her chest as she ran, Steph allowed her mind to wander. Where were they going to go? Did Tom have a plan? She sincerely hoped so. Surely by now, the entire Cull Enforcement Agency would be searching for them and all the other condemned people who had been lucky enough to escape the centre tonight. 

Steph knew that the agency would do anything and everything in its power to round up the escapees as soon as possible and take them back into custody. After all, how would it look if the very country that had first proposed the culls to the rest of the world allowed so-called Cudos to escape their fates? 

Subconsciously, she raised a hand to her throat, which still felt tender from the pressure that the agent had applied to it earlier and she was certain would be covered in bruises by tomorrow. She rubbed her fingertips across the sensitive skin as his face appeared in her mind's eye in crystal clear high definition, as though he were standing right in front of her. His squinting, dark eyes had been so full of hatred, of pure rage, that even picturing them now sent an icy chill running down her spine. 

No one had ever had cause to look at her that way before, and she sincerely hoped that they never would again. The agent had looked down at her as though she were nothing. Not even human. She couldn’t bear the idea of having to tolerate anyone looking at her that way again, of anyone feeling such hatred for her. 

Sucking in another lungful of warm air which burned just as harshly as the last, Tom tried to estimate how long they had been running. Ten minutes? Fifteen? He knew he could cover a mile or so in that time back on the treadmill in the rundown gym in the basement of the hospital where he worked, which barely anyone but him bothered to use. But out here? Sprinting across uneven terrain with a busted ankle and Steph with her battered ribs trying to keep up with him? He couldn’t even estimate how far away from the centre they had managed to travel as they zig-zagged through the trees. 

Brushing beads of sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, Tom racked his brains, desperately trying to formulate some kind of plan. 

Everything had happened so fast back at the centre that he didn’t feel as though he had had a moment to process the events of the evening at all. One minute, he had been trying to steal a few last precious moments with his father, trying to repair what he could of their damaged relationship before his time ran out, and the next, his entire world had been turned on its head yet again. Only this time, with no warning or time to prepare himself. 

When Jack Walker had initially attempted to get Tom out of his death sentence, when he had gone behind his back and spoken to his friend in government to try and get him a reprieve by sending someone else to be murdered in his place, Tom had been mortified. He had sworn there and then that he would see this through. That he would accept the hand that fate had dealt him, and hold his head up high until the bitter end. He had done his best to come to terms with his situation and make peace with the broken world that he was about to leave and had accepted it as much as any man could. 

And now, here he was. On the run with a woman that he barely knew but whom he felt duty-bound to protect. With nothing more than the clothes on his back, his dad’s tattered old leather wallet and a few meagre medical supplies shoved into his pockets. With absolutely no idea what to do, or where to go next.