Escape
Prompt: Expected
Words: 1003
Author: Me :P
Disclaimer: No mate, this one's ALL MINE!
Comments: Always welcome :D

Running, always running. Who from this time? Jason looked behind him as he ran and saw three Town Security Officials running after him, getting closer. Jason was running through a field, towards the woods – so close, but so tired. He'd been running for what felt like hours, but he had to go – keep running for the woods. He didn't know why but he sensed it was safe there. It had to be, why else was he running there?

But the woods never got closer, if anything they kept moving further away, in desperation he reached out. As he did so, he felt a hand touch his shoulder, and he knew then it was too late.

Jason woke with a start, gasping for air, dripping with sweat. He touched his shoulder where he was so sure an officer had grabbed him a second ago. Nothing.

He looked around, catching his breath. He's in his bedroom. Same as usual, small, damp, drab. The air raid siren was going off, and his twin sister appeared at the doorway. "Come on Jase!" Jason held his chest as he tried to breathe normally, "Come on, the air raid's going." He waved his hand at her instead, and took a breath, "you go down with mum, I'm going to go out."

"Again?!"

"I need to see if there's anything else they are saying before we go," Jason explained. Lilia just sighed and asked, "just, please be quick, okay? Don't let them see you."

Jason got out of bed and pulled on a t-shirt and coat over his pyjamas, "They haven't caught me yet."

Outside, Jason hid behind a bin in the porch and looked up. There were definitely aircrafts, but he has learnt a year ago that these aircrafts weren't dropping bombs, but leaflets, information from the outside world.

"Your government is lying!"

"The war ended 50 years ago!"

"Your soldiers are only killing each other!"

The first time he found the information was by chance. He'd noticed in the last five years that despite near daily air raids, all the homes in the village were still standing. The news was full of pictures of places that had been bombed, and aircrafts being shot down – but in the time he'd known, Although the pictures and videos of aircraft being brought down were probably real, everything in the village and in the nearest town was undamaged. No more than usual anyway.

Then one day the siren went off while he was outside, everyone ran to a shelter but he tripped and fell down a set of stairs to a park, and he passed out. When he awoke, he saw the street was littered with pamphlets. He grabbed one as he got up, rubbed his head and peared.

"There is no more oil – there are alternatives. Your government is making you suffer needlessly"

He then heard a man calling, "Come on boys! Let's get this cleaned up quick!" He knew that what he had hold of would get him in trouble, so he ran and hid until the all clear was called, then went home to finish reading.

Over the next year Jason had done research, finding a way through the controlled intranet to look at websites from the outside world. He didn't think it was wise to take the word of one pamphlet from the enemy so went searching.

And what he discovered chilled him.

The war that the British Government was supposedly fighting was originally over the last of the North Sea oil. Norway won out and used the oil to developm other technologies as replacements. They tried, along with the rest of the world, to sell or even just offer these replacements to Britain. But Britain shut themselves off from the world, opting instead for rolling blackouts, food hand outs from the state, and – worst of all, population control.

Jason picked up a leaflet from the latest round of propaganda dropped by the 'enemy'.

"We're coming for you!"

It was nothing new, he knew they were coming, and it contained no new information on a meeting point either. He sighed, so it's the same plan – leave in the morning, head to Plymouth, swim… Really, swim, out to sea to a ship ready to pick us up and take us to Spain.

"Can't we get a dingy instead?" Lilia had asked him, but a dingy would stand out. No good if they're escaping. He and his twin had spent the last 6 months training in the local river, swimming longer and longer distances each time to prepare.

Jason wasn't exactly sure if they were ready for this, but it had to be tomorrow. There wouldn't be another opportunity for months. And their 16th birthdays were the following week.

At 16 they'd be called up to train and fight in a battle that didn't even exist. This was their population control. Half were sent back from training to continue population the country. Although a good portion of them lived in dire poverty anyway and died, also helping to keep the population down. The other half were trained, and then made to kill each other. The very idea made him feel ill, the fact that he would be called up next week to try his luck at surviving terrified him.

The government told the families that their children would be back when the war was over. Not one has returned. No one expects it will any time soon. So they wait.

There was every chance that the government knew of this escape plan and would be guarding the seas. But he'd rather die trying to escape than kill another human being.

Jason ran back inside without being seen and joined his mother and sister in the basement. His mother, relieved to see him, held him close and told him off for worrying her. He held her, whispering for her not to worry, and gave a nod to his twin. She nodded back in understanding.

The escape is on.