Forgotness: Book 1: 200m

We ran along the rampart, jumped down, ducked behind some crates and hoped no one had seen us. Flames had dripped down from the gate mouth to the ground below setting fire to some wooden containers and a cart.

We heard a gun go off.

Bent low and keeping to the darker shadows we moved through the crates slowly, trying to get as far as possible away from the fire.

Suddenly the whole area was lit up with electric lights. There was a shout by the gate. We peered over the top of a crate and saw the soldiers spreading out to search the area. They were heading towards us.

We had to move but we had run out of things to hide behind.

There was another shout.

“Hey Toppers! Over here!” It was Brentford, the great oaf.

A big light came on and swung over the ground until it found Brentford standing on top of the wall on the west side. The soldiers turned and raised their guns. Brentford jumped into the dark beyond just as they opened fire. We made a run for it.

It took seconds for the soldiers to notice us. A shot was fired, it missed and hit the wall ahead. Then the search light was turned on us. We could see our shadow stretching long across the ground, our head twisted up the wall. Little bites of stone were being flicked up into the air as more bullets hit the ground around our feet. We jumped up, our hands reached the top of the wall and we pulled ourself up. We scrambled over as bullets slammed into the wall around us. We could hear soldiers running forwards. Then we rolled over the wall and dropped into darkness. The ground came up fast. We landed on all fours, rolled and were up and running away from the light.

The firing stopped.

The searchlight drifted across the ground giving us a better idea of what lay ahead as we ran on in the dark. First was a road which we ran across, beyond that a fence that we vaulted, and on into a field of some large-leafed crop.

The light drifted towards us and we dived to the ground and lay still. Our muddy brown garments blended in. Cauliflowers! We grabbed one. The light went over us. We got up and ran and lay down again when it returned. This time though it was behind us.

Then we were running steadily uphill across the field. When we reached the top we paused to catch our breath and look back.

We could see the wall, long and high, disappearing into the darkness on either side of the Gate. We watched a group of soldiers march out of the little fort, line up and then, slowly, they began walking up the hill towards us. Each had a torch that searched the ground around them.

It was time for us to move on.

We started jogging north, avoiding the houses and farms. Soon we had left the line of soldiers far behind. Even the light from their torches had disappeared.

We wondered if Brentford had escaped, and Cam, and Stamford. The soldiers did seem to be looking only in our direction.

After half an hour of running we slowed to a walk. The ground rolled up and down. The fields were enclosed with stone walls or wire fences though sometimes one crop would just finish and a another one begin. It was hard to believe how much food was being grown.

There was a flash and then another far off to our left, west, then came the sound of shots fired, then more flashes and more shots.

We got nervous and checked behind, sure enough there were the torches in the distance, closer. They had not given up looking for us. We started jogging again.

It seemed that they were able to track us. In a few hours it would be sunrise and we would be easy to spot crossing these wide open fields. We needed somewhere to hide.

We jogged on through the night trying to shake our pursuers. But all the doubling back and trying to hide our footprints slowed us down.

Just as we were crossing a road between two low stone walls we heard an engine and sure enough up the hill came twin beams of light. We jumped the wall on the far side of the road and lay still in its shadow.

The engine noise grew louder and louder. It passed our hiding place but stopped ten or so metres further up the hill.

“Everybody out.” There were sounds of heavy boots on the road. More soldiers. “I want you lined up along the wall twenty steps apart and keep low, we don’t want to be seen by this thing. They move fast and they kill.”

“Yes Sir!” Replied the soldiers loudly.

“And remember, our lads are driving it on so don’t go shooting one of our lot.”

There were a few laughs.

“Right,” shouted a much angrier voice, “you heard the Captain, line up sharpish, heads down, eyes open, on the double.”

We lay flat and pulled our hood over our head, with only the slightest gap to see out of: eyes and teeth are too easy to spot in the dark.

At first there was a lot of noise as the soldiers took up position.

Then there was silence.

We considered our options. There weren’t many. We could stay here and hope no one looked over the wall. We could creep along the wall and hope no one heard us. Or we could head straight out across the field while it was still dark and hope no one saw us.

Suddenly a figure appeared about twenty metres away, leaning over the wall. They shone a small torch up the back of the wall away from where we lay and then played the light down towards us. We barely had time to put our head down and close our eyes. We could almost feel the light pass over as we waited for the shout of alarm. Through our eyelids we could see the light slide back over. Still nothing. Then it was clicked off. We heard more steps walking down the hill towards us, getting closer and closer.

“Anything Sergeant?” Asked the first voice.

“No Sir. Just going to check down at the bottom, Sir.”

The soldier walked past us and on down the hill. A minute later we saw the torch again, but it was some distance away and it was never pointed far enough back up the hill to reach our hiding place.

Perhaps our clothing, which was, to be honest, not much more than rags, looked like flattened nettles from a distance.

We decided to stay right where we were, night was already coming to an end and it would be very easy to be seen out in the open. So, as quietly as we could, we burrowed into the wet earth under the wall. We pulled clumps of earth and weeds from under us and lay them on top and gradually disappeared into the ground.

We dozed off and woke to the sound of an engine starting. The noise was incredible, if we let out a gasp no one would have heard it above the roar. A cloud of blue smoke drifted over the wall.

It was light now and looking round we could see for many kilometres over rolling hills with cloudy mist gathering in the lowest areas. We lay on the north side of the wall so it was still in shade, not deep shade but every little bit helped.

We heard voices and could smell warm food that made our stomach grumble alarmingly.

“Any sign?” A distant voice shouted.

“No. Nothing our end. Are you sure it came this way?”

“Not sure,“ the voice was closer now, “but possible, probable.”

There was some noise of a wall being climbed. “No, I can’t be certain. We’ve not seen any tracks for the last mile or so. ”

“So eight got in this time I hear?”

“Yes eight, another four were stopped at the gate. Two were shot inside the gatehouse, three have already been caught and I suspect one was killed last night. You hear those shots? So three still on the loose: this one I was tracking up here and two more coming up the valley close to Gorse Lane.”

“Any pictures?”

“None yet, but there will be, the gate camera wasn’t damaged.”

“Any idea where they’re headed?”

“Not sure. This one seemed to be heading straight north towards Buxton. But they’re taken in by the farmers sometimes. They make for cheap workers.”

“Yes, I’ve heard that. But still. I’ll be taking my men back to the Ireton Barracks and I guess you’ll be heading back to the Gate?”

“Oh no, I’ve not finished. I’m sure I’ll pick up a scent soon.”

“OK, well, good luck and if you need us you know where we are.” The engine roared again and with vibrations we could feel through the ground, it drove off. We wondered how many soldiers remained and where they were exactly. In all the time we had lain there we had never dared look over the top of the wall.

There were more sounds: footsteps and talk which we couldn’t make out and wafts of cigarette smoke.

The talk continued. We could make out three or four different people now, but the voice in charge talked a lot to no one and yet seemed to get replies.

“Yes, no, no sign, not since last night. Yes we’re going to retrace. No, not giving up. Yes heading north. Buxton maybe, upper Macclesfield. Yes. Yes. Yes.”

Then the conversation stopped. There was a pause, some steps, and then quiet until:

“Right. We’re going back to the A517 where we last saw some tracks. It should be easier in daylight. Johnson you stay here in case we flush one out. And remember, shoot first.”

“Yes Ma’am.”

There were sounds of soldiers climbing the far wall and walking off over the field. Then silence.

We waited, it could have been an hour hour, more?

We were just about to move when a soldier lent over the wall right above us. With elbows on the stone the soldier gazed out over the countryside smoking a cigarette. Any second now the soldier was going to look down and... the cigarette fell to the ground.

We jumped up in an explosion of mud and weeds.

The soldier staggered off the verge, tripped and fell backwards onto the road and lay motionless.

After a few seconds staring at the unmoving body we turned and ran up the field, staying close to the wall. Then, realising that we would leave less tracks on the tarmac, we jumped over the wall and, still staying low, continued on up the road. Now at least we were blocked from view on either side. We hoped we hadn’t killed the soldier.

We ran up the road. When we got to the top of the hill we were able to see a couple of kilometres in every direction. Behind us to the south, but also to the east and west, the hill rolled down into mist, but northwards there was a gap in the fog about a kilometre wide and a road ran through the middle and onto a much larger stretch of land. Beyond that were a line of hills so high they had to be mountains.

We needed to get across the gap and onto the mainland before they realised where we were. How long before they found the soldier’s body?

Still keeping low we continued running along the road, now heading downhill. There was smoke rising from some houses and in one field we saw huge black and white cows.

We slowed down to a walk hoping that it might seem less suspicious.

Luckily the mist was starting to close in again and soon it began raining as well so visibility dropped to a few hundred metres.

By mid morning we reached the point where the road crossed over to the mainland. But here the road split in two with one heading east and the other more north west. A signpost stuck out of the ground pointing east to Kirk Ireton and north to Knockerdown. As the soldiers had mentioned Ireton, we thought it safer to take the Knockerdown road.

We were not long on the north road before we heard another vehicle coming. We saw lights in the mist to the east so we lay down in the ditch by the road and waited. A big green lorry with a cab at the front and a canvas roof at the back drove past heading back the way we had come. It carried on up the hill and out of sight.

They would find the soldier’s body and come after us. It was time to run.

The road curved round first west and then south, and soon we were splashing in and out of water. This went on for a couple of kilometres before the road disappeared completely. We could feel the tarmac under our feet so we kept going, unsure if this was the right way at all.

We wondered about the wall. Was it somewhere to the south? Was it flooded? Could this be a route in for the Wetland clans?

We waded on. It felt good to feel the sea again, safer. If a lorry appeared now we felt we could swim off into deep water and escape pretty easily.

After another couple of kilometres, after the water had changed levels many times, the road started to climb again. We hoped we had thrown the pursuit off a bit. Though now we had a choice: continue north or turn south to find out about the wall?

We decided to go south so, sticking close to the water’s edge, we started walking on round the coast. After ten minutes the coast curved west again but about a kilometre away, straight ahead we could see land, so we took to the water and swam across.

This continued for the rest of the day, walking and swimming between spits of land always heading further south until just before nightfall we saw the wall again in the distance. We could see it rising out of the water onto land and we could see the water breaking over the wall where it was just below the surface. Above the wall and following its line over the water was a single chain moored on each side to great rocks. There we noticed, on my side at least, a small camp of three tents and a smoking fire.

So, even here there was a guard, maybe not difficult to overrun but it would make it harder for the clans to get in unnoticed.

We decided to settle down for the night, in some trees that were close to the water’s edge but tucked away in a dip of land. We slung up our hammock as high as possible in the tree and, after a meal of snails and some raw cauliflower, went to sleep.