She had to run, she didn't have a choice. She reminded herself over and over. She had to run. It was the only way. El didn't have the ability to go unnoticed. She wasn't as obvious as some but she didn't fit the mould, she had always been noted, been watched. They never would have just let her be, they would never let her go. She didn't have a choice. She had a plan, she was going to come back. They had a plan, they were going to run together.

Flick still had three months before she turned eighteen. It was only three months and she fit in. She looked like them, she seemed like them. She wasn't being watched. She had three months. Still she wanted to leave with El, she begged to leave with El. It wasn't practical, if she ran before she turned eighteen they could track her. They would have found her, found them. That's what El told her, that's what she said. She was going to come back, they had a plan.

The plan was simple, it was easy. It was the same plan others had followed, one that worked more often than anyone was willing to admit. There were processes in place, hidden beneath the structures of society ready to rescue those that didn't fit, those that might fall through the gaps and into the horrors of the below. The stuff no one talks about, the stuff no one wants to acknowledge because they are complicit. They let it happen.

Those from the Underground had found El easily. She didn't stand out in an obvious way, but she was easy to recognise for those looking. Her family, her friends, they didn't see because they didn't want to but other people did and El could feel them watching. She didn't trust those from the Underground but she didn't have a choice, she had to run and she wouldn't survive on her own.

They didn't know about Flick. She was often overlooked, although El couldn't understand it. El was always looking at Flick. El refused to go underground unless they agreed to come back for Flick, it was all she cared about, all she wanted. Flick was the reason El was running, she made hiding worth while. They agreed to come back and El only let herself cry at night missing Flick as she dreamed about their uncertain future.

The Underground was surprisingly not underground. There was sunshine as often as there was rain. It was bright and lively. So beyond everything El could have imagined that she soon stopped dreaming of despair and began hoping for happiness. A happiness that had seemed more and more impossible the older she got, the closer she got to eighteen. An arbitrary date, but an important one. According to the law children couldn't be deviant, at seventeen they were protected by purity but the minute they turned eighteen they were on their own.

When they were younger, before they understood the choice they would face, El and Flick used to pretend they were twins. Pretend they shared the same birthday, the same family, the same blood. That way they would be linked together forever and no one could tear them apart.

El knew she was wrong, different, before Flick did. El knew she would have to run for years before she left, for years before she knew Flick would want to run with her. She was only eleven when she first realised, first understood there was no way her and Flick could stay together forever. They would be ripped apart whether El ran or not. Their separation seemed inevitable to El for so long, it was sometimes hard for her to remember she would be with Flick again in her three months alone in the Underground.

The day came quicker than El imagined. The last week before they left was filled with packing and planning. There was no time to think, no time to worry, no time to wonder what could go wrong. There was hope on the horizon of El's future for the first time since she was eleven years old and she wasn't going to let anything dampen her excitement.

El knew it went wrong sometimes, during her three month say in the Underground she had watched people leave and never come back or come back empty handed with sad eyes. It was the dangerous reality of their situation that was often masked by the beauty of their sanctuary. Early in her stay El had worried about Flick's rescue, extraction they called it. She worried and wondered and went through every possible outcome as she lay awake unable to sleep without knowing Flick was safe. As time wore on, El's anticipation and excitement replaced misery and fear. She was going to get Flick and they were going to be together forever just like they planned when they were kids. Just like they dreamed.

They left before the sun, hiding in the shadows until they could slip into the stream of society without being noticed. It was surprisingly easy to blend when people weren't looking for them, searching for them. It was almost fun to play pretend as long as they maintained the ability to take off their masks at the end of the day.

El's mind was continually replaying clips of happy times with Flick, imagining how good it was going to feel to see her, to feel her again. It was one of the happiest days of her life until it all fell apart. El was happier than she'd ever been until she looked into Flick's eyes and saw a lack of recognition that felt like her heart had been pulled from her chest and ripped in half. Flick had been stolen from her, they had put they grubby hands all over her brain cutting out every part of El there was.

They found her in a public place, as was the plan. A place they would go unnoticed, a place Flick would be able to make contact and make her final choice. It was supposed to be easy. There was no need to spend days, weeks, trying to convince someone to leave their life, their family, their home. Flick had already made her choice, the rest was just a formality. She knew what to expect, knew what to do, she had been through it all with El. They would be in and out, two days max.

It's always someone they know, someone they knew, that makes contact. Someone that went missing and survived, so they see it can be done. They go alone, not to overwhelm or frighten. That was the way it was done and it worked more often than it didn't but it also meant El was alone when she realised she'd been altered.

"Who are you?" Three words shattered El's world. The light of hope she'd been holding on to, she'd been giving into, was fire and it burned. Flick's eyes were clouded as she spoke, a clear sign of alteration. Flick wasn't scared, which meant they hadn't changed her emotions, her reactions. They had simply removed all traces of El from her mind, leave a hole that had already started to heal.

El hadn't expected an alteration. She hadn't anticipated it. She had gone through every likely scenario but alteration wasn't one of them. Flick was unnoticeable, she was in the perfect position to hide, to remain untouched. The only apparently abnormal part of Flick was her friendship with El. When El left that should have ended, they should have moved on to someone else, but they didn't. It hit El like a swarm of bees, the only thing that changed was El. She ran and someone altered Flick. It was her fault.

Flick's expression shifted from confusion to concern, the mess they had made of her memories had not effected her natural empathy. She looks the same, thinks El. She looks like the girl she left behind, the girl she loved, but there's something missing. It's like looking at an almost perfect forgery, she looks the same but the feeling isn't there. There's nothing underneath the facade.

"Sorry I thought you were someone else," said El, trying to take control of situation. Trying to figure out what she's supposed to do, how she's supposed to fix this.

The smile is so familiar it breaks a piece of her heart El didn't know she had left. Flick seems almost happy to have been mistaken for someone, like it's the most interesting thing that's happened to her in months. Maybe it is for her, thinks El, she probably doesn't know she was taken away and rearranged.

Flick speaks before El can figure out an easy exit, "that's happened to me a lot recently. All kinds of people thinking I was someone they knew. I must have a doppleganger out there somewhere."

"That must be it," El forced herself to say through the pain. She knows should start the speech they give to new recruits, the speech about the Underground and the promise of escape. She had rehearsed it even though she didn't think she'd have to say it. But there's something stopping her, a hint of doubt that's been biting at her relationship with Flick since it began.

"I'm Felicity," said Flick, as though it was normal for her to use her full name. "I know I'm not the person you thought I was, but I could be an awesome understudy."

She's lonely, thinks El, missing a friend she doesn't know she's lost. She must be lonely, El and Flick usually kept to themselves especially after they realised they would have to leave, have to run. Except now Flick doesn't have to run, she can stay in her home, stay with her family. She can have a normal life and she wouldn't know there was another option. El should leave, she should walk away and let Flick have the life she deserved. She has to let go.

El can't let go, not quite yet. Instead of walking away she stays, introducing herself with the fake name the Underground gave her to get around. She stays, talking to Flick longer than she should, longer than is safe. She stays because even thought she should leave Flick looks lonely, she looks lost, and El isn't ready to say goodbye.

When she gets back to her rescuers, her keepers, she doesn't get the reaction she expected. They are not shocked, they are not surprised, apparently this has happened before. They're still keen to bring Flick in, to rescue her, and they're pleased El made friends. It'll be easier if she trusts, they need her to trust. It's better when people come willingly.

They're not going to let her go, El realised. They're going to take her whether she wants to go or not. El doesn't understand it, she can't understand why they would take the risk, why they would bother, when she remembers they don't know. They don't know Flick had the option, they don't know Flick could have had a normal life. They don't know she chose the underground for El. They don't know El took something that never should have been hers.

Still, she can't stop herself from going back the next day and the day after. She was never going to tell her, never going to let them take her. She just wanted to see Flick one more time, one last time. But one last time is never enough, she always needs one more. The more they see each other, the more Flick returns to herself like El is filling the void left inside her memory moment by moment, one conversation at a time.

El's being safe, she's sure to avoid certain topics. She wants a part of herself to be inside Flick but she doesn't want Flick to know the truth. Flick couldn't know the truth. She had to have a chance, she was too bright to be kept underground.

The eighth time they met, the eighth moment she saw Flick since she'd been rearranged, the bubble El had been living in burst. It had taken eight meetings, eight moments, eight goodbyes El had intended to be the very last, eight lapses of weakness that kept her coming back. Eight opportunities for El to let go of Flick, eight times Flick could have been saved until it was too late until eyes opened and glass cracked.

Flick was different the eighth time, El could see it from the start. Something was wrong, something was up. She asked El to follow her and El did even though she knew it was a trap. She was likely walking willingly towards her doom but she didn't care because Flick asked her to follow and El would follow Flick forever. Their time was almost up, and El didn't want to go back alone, she didn't want to be one of those sad faces.

They reached a gap in the wall, a small dent in the road, one they could slip into and be hidden for a moment. El was confused, they were close. Too close. Pushed together by the lack of space. It was the closest El had been to Flick since she ran, since she left Flick behind, it was almost too much. She held her breath and waited for whatever would come, if it was the end at least she was ending with Flick.

"What is this?" asked Flick pulling something from her pocket and shoving it into El's face. It took a second for El's eyes to focus, to understand what she was seeing.

"It's a photograph," replied El, her everything completely focused on the image in front of her. A strip of film, from a Photo Booth, bent and creased like it had been folded too many times but still instantly recognisable. El would have know what it was even if they people pictured were broken beyond repair. There they where, smiling, holding each other, kissing in a second of innocence. El remembered that day, she remembered those photos, she remembers the fear and the freedom she felt taking them.

"Why don't I remember this?" demanded Flick her voice dripping with tears.

"You know why," answered El sadly because it was the truth. Flick wanted confirmation but she didn't need it. She already knew what had happened to her, everyone knew what happened to people who thought the wrong thing, who said the wrong thing. She knew she'd been altered and El couldn't imagine what that felt like. To know someone had messed around inside your head, taken the sanctity of your past and changed it.

"We were friends," said El.

"We were more than friends?" asked Flick.

"We were," confirmed El.

It hurt, but El knew there was too much to say, too much to explain. They didn't have time. El was due back, and they would come looking if she didn't return. She had to go, she had to let go. El had to run again, that's what she thought, she was about to run.

"Have you come to help me?" asked Flick.

El looked back at her friend, her love, in horror. Flick's words sounded like a plea, they didn't sound like someone who's perfect life had been shattered. She sounded lost, she sounded alone, she sounded like El had when the Underground had first come for her. Flick sounded like they all did at first, like they couldn't believe there was another option, like they couldn't believe there was a way out.

"Are you here to rescue me?" asked Flick.

That's when El realised, that's when she knew, they may have ripped her from Flick's memory but that didn't change who she was. Flick didn't remember El but she was still Flick and Flick had always wanted out. She had. El thought Flick did it for her, but that was a lie, a selfish lie. Flick loved El but she wanted to run for herself. She might have had a choice but she didn't want to stay somewhere that wouldn't allow her that choice. Flick fit in, but she didn't belong and she never would.

El didn't know if Flick would ever love her again, and she knew things would never be the same, but none of that mattered because Flick needed to run. They needed to run.

"Take my hand," said El and Flick did without a thought even without the memories she still trusted or maybe she didn't have a choice but to trust. El wouldn't stop, wouldn't let go until she had proved that trust worth while.

They had to run, they didn't have a choice. But they didn't have to be alone. They wanted to run, and they could run together.