"Did you hear that?" Natalia's voice was barely a whisper as she paused after hearing the distinctive sound of a car in the distance, they were nearing the edge of the forest now, and a long road lay ahead of them, a few more trees and a field lay on the other side of the road.
"It could be any sort of car Tals." Isaac told her. "It might not be them."
"But it might be." She replied. "I'm so scared."
"We'll be okay Nat, I promise." Carter slowed down so the two caught up to him. He smiled reassuringly at her, she didn't smile back.
"I don't know Car, we're too in the open here." She replied, barely looking at him as she glanced over her shoulder. "I don't want to go back there."
"We won't, we're not going to." Isaac told her determinedly, he managed to reassure her somewhat.
"Of course we won't." Carter added quickly, it seemed too quickly, or was she being eaten alive by her insecurities about him. She was just being stupid, Carter wasn't working with them and he wasn't lying to them, he was their friend. He wouldn't do that to them, would he? The doubt was still in her mind, but she was determined to push it away, she couldn't risk her own doubt to cost them their freedom.
"You're right, I'm just being stupid." She shook her head.
"Tals, don't worry, I'm scared too, we all are, but we have to keep going." Isaac said comfortingly. She nodded, she was glad Isaac was there, he knew her so well and could almost tell what she was thinking. The two were fairly close and she knew Carter felt left out sometimes, but she couldn't help it, there were places in her memory where she didn't recall Carter being there at all and then one day he had been, it was strange but she had always assumed the experiments had affected her memory, until now. Now she was beginning to wonder if he had been there in the start of their lives in the facility. Natalia jumped out of her thoughts as Isaac dragged her out of the way of a tree. "Look where you're going Tals!"
"Sorry, I was thinking." She replied, he stared at her, clutching his heart.
"You, thinking, Never!" He said, gasping dramatically. She rolled her eyes at him.
"You're hilarious you know that."
"Why thank you, I do try." Isaac bowed with a flourish.
"Come on you two, or we'll never get anywhere." Carter had gone on ahead, not realising they had stopped until he had glanced over his shoulder.
"Sorry Car, Natalia was being annoying." Isaac said as they caught up with him. Natalia gasped and slapped his arm.
"So rude!"
"Me? Rude? Not a chance." Isaac shook his head. "Tell her Car."
"Blasphemy Nat, absolute blasphemy." He agreed with a laugh.
"you're all so mean to me!" She huffed as a reply.
"Awe did we upset you?" Carter teased her, she pouted at him, and sniffed.
"Yeah." She gave them a mournful look. The boys laughed and each wrapped an arm around her shoulders.
"Love you really Tals." Isaac announced.
"I don't want your sympathy!" Natalia ran out of their grip and slightly ahead of them, where she stopped dead in her tracks.
"Natalia?" Carter asked slowly, as he came up beside her. Ahead of them, stood their parents, luckily they hadn't noticed their children, who darted quickly into the woods.
"Oh my god." Isaac whispered. "How are they here already?"
"We need to move, come on!" Natalia instructed as she ran ahead, they quickly followed her, fearing their freedom, they were headed further away from the facility, and hopefully their parents and the fear of capture.
"That was too close." Carter said as they stopped for a moment to catch their breath. "I don't understand how they got there, how did they know this would be the direction we would come?"
"I don't know, but I don't think we should stick around to find out either." Isaac replied, leaning against a tree as his breathing steadied.
"we need to be more careful, they could have seen us." Natalia said, as she grabbed at the stray strands of her hair and forced it into the bun she had previously pulled the rest of her hair into. "We should keep going." She added as the sounds of vehicles came closer to them.
"Yeah, that could be them." Isaac agreed as they set off again, they could hear shouts coming from far behind them, voices they knew very well, but voices that terrified them to the bone, memories of the experiments, the pain, the torment inflicted upon them by their own parents over powered the want to listen to their parents, listen to the obedience that had been drilled into them since birth, like fighting an instinct.
They ran almost straight into the tall, imposing figure of Carter's father. Natalia's blood ran cold as she saw him, she turned around quickly to see their parents walking towards them, feeling trapped, she grabbed both Carter and Isaac by the wrist and ran diagonally past Carter's father. He made a grab for them, but she had managed to move them quickly enough to avoid it.
"Go!" She yelled desperately as they once again made a run for it, this time with the physically fitter and taller figures of their parents chasing them, freedom suddenly became a whisper on the wind, small and unimportant.