"Ouch! What did you have to do that for?"

I rubbed the sore spot on my left hip, while my head still span from the bang it had received on my way down the hole.

Marco helped me up, his tight grip bruised my arm. We were at the start of a long, dark tunnel, barely big enough for one of us to pass through at a time. Marco grabbed my chin and forced my face up so he could look at me. I supposed he'd be checking for concussion or injuries. He let me go soon enough with a grunt of satisfaction.

From behind him, Dante spoke from the darkness, the trapdoor must have been closed behind us. His voice, barely above a whisper.

"For goodness sake! Keep your voice down, Tyke. Now get moving, the pair of you."

As I shuffled off down the tunnel, tiny LED lights flicked on. I guessed that they'd been triggered by our motion and they illuminated the ground beside my feet as I went on. The trainers I'd been given were slightly too big and so I scuffed the toe regularly as I walked along. I could feel Marco at my back, breathing down my neck with irritation at the slow pace I set. Eventually, I gave up trying to combat the dim lighting and dizziness I had to deal with, and I crouched as low as possible so that Marco would be able to get around me to take the lead. I grumbled as I curled into a ball, wishing this whole scenario could be over.

"Just get us out of this."

My muttered prayers were answered, as not only Marco, but also Dante, took turns to leap over me and continue to set off the ground level lights, as they walked ahead.

"Tyke!" Dante called back to me, as he followed after Marco's disappearing figure. "Get a shift on or we'll never make it before dawn."

I stood upright and stretched my aching back.

"What's so important about dawn?" I stumbled after my companions, calling out in a half whisper, half scowl. "Is there something you two aren't telling me? Because if that's the case then I'd like you to know that I don't take kindly to being led stupidly into the worst situation I could imagine. And believe me, I can imagine situations bad enough to make even your little bit of hair curl, Marco."

A flush of bravery followed my explosion, making me stronger than I thought. It threw me off balance when I received the hissed reprimand that Dante dained to throw back at me.

"Shut up, Poll. I've never met a girl so irritating. Do you honestly have a response for every single situation this world has to offer you? Don't you ever wish there was something in this universe that would stun you into silence? Because God knows, I do."

His tirade made me stop in my tracks, and I fought back the sting of tears as the full hit of his words sank in. Is this really what he thought of me? I swallowed and gathered myself together before rushing after their retreating LED lit footwear. I could have sworn I heard Marco's low snigger as we moved along. No doubt he loved the whiplashing I'd been given.

We carried on down through the tunnel for what seemed to be a couple of hours to me, but in all likelihood was no more than half an hour or so. I found out a long time ago that the actual passing of time had very little to do with my impression of it, and much more to do with the quality of the actions involved in that period.

Eventually a different shade of dark emerged in front of the two men ahead. Their shapes became more visible and a fresh waft of clean air flowed back to me. I took in a deep breath, loving the scent of pine and greenery.

Coming out through the tunnel exit, Dante snatched at my hand and pulled me down to the ground. For some reason, all three of us were now crouching behind a thick gorse bush. Marco warned me to be quiet with a finger pressed to his mouth.

I hissed at him and made the most of this opportunity to move in closer to Dante. He fiddled with the zip on his backpack, his eyes fixed on whatever it was that had made them hide so quick. After watching him suffer for a while with the bag, I gave up hoping he'd get it open by himself and tore back the zip for him. He refused to look at me, but mumbled a grunt of gratitude my way. He rummaged around for a moment before yanking out what seemed to be a type of pen. What did he expect to do with that?

Now, totally confused at our predicament, I stole a sneak peek over the top of the bush. So that's what this was about. There, sat in the middle of a gravel pathway amongst a forest. A fox! Oblivious to our presence, it cleaned one of its front paws, licking and pulling at the claws with its teeth.

Entranced by the animal, I hadn't noticed that Dante had joined me above the top of the gorse, and I got a shock as he blew a dart out of the pen, just millimetres from my cheek.

It was too dark to follow the flight of the dart, but I saw the resulting twitch of the fox's back as it found its target. The creature gave a sharp bark of fright before it collapsed to the path.

"Come on, Poll." Dante whispered, with a childlike enthusiasm. "Give me a hand to collect the data."

Marco jerked upright and flicked on the torch he had been carrying the whole time.

"Typical." I snarled at him. "And you couldn't have used that before because...?"

Ignoring me, Marco waved the torch in the direction of the animal and left us to go and stand in the opening of the tunnel.

Dante pushed at my back and we trod gently towards the fox. It didn't move. The closer I got, the more I could see the rich colourings of the fur, the leathery pads of the paws and lolling pink tongue between its teeth. Dante knelt down close to the animal and fished in his pocket.

"I need you to hold its mouth open for me, Poll. Its a wonderful, healthy specimen. I never thought I'd see one again."

"You want me to do what?"

"Hold his jaws apart so I can get a reading. It's not brain surgery."

"I do hope you're joking. There's no way I'm sticking my fingers anywhere near those teeth."

"Don't be such a child, Poll, he's knocked out cold, but if you don't bloody hurry up he'll be awake and out of here before I can get it. Now get on with it, you big baby."

I could feel my cheeks burning red. How dare he! He tapped his finger at a small, rectangular device with a screen, making it blip and beep. I stood up to go, anywhere, as long as it would be away from him at this point in time.

"Do it yourself, Dante."

As I turned to go, Dante held onto my leg, his face rigid with desperation, his voice pleaded but still with an edge of anger.
"You have to help me, Poll. Please? I may never get the chance again, this is so important for the rebellion. We have to be quick."

Probably realising that these words carried little weight with me, he changed tactics and spoke to me on a level I could comprehend.

"Come on, Tyke. This means more to me than you could know. I'll owe you big time."

"Well, if you put it that way." I knelt back down next to him and let him guide my hands with his own, around the mouth of the fox.

"Just like this..." His voice had calmed now and the touch of his strong fingers sent chills down my spine. I took control of the sleeping animal and gently prised its jaws apart.

Without hesitation, Dante swooped in to stick the device into the mouth cavity and it beeped away happily as it did what it had to do. This went on for a few minutes, and my knees began to turn numb. Suddenly, we were woken to danger by a whistle from Marco.

He must have been on the lookout for trouble, or maybe to the officers who'd been invited by the Neighbours that evening. Who could say. Either way, it had the desired effect. Dante stuffed the device back into his black leather jacket and picked up the fox's limp body.

"We've got to get him away from them. Now!"

He sounded frantic and I bent immediately to his level of danger, hoping to get back in his good books.
"Let's head towards the trees over there." I pointed out the thicker part of the forest that stretched out to the right of the gravel pathway. "If we can get deeper in, then we should find a place suitable enough to leave him."

Dante appeared to be on the same wavelength. He glanced quickly towards Marco and raised the thumb on his left hand to signal something or other. Then we headed off into the thick growth of trees, Dante cradled the creature like a baby, with me following on close behind.

The forest came alive with sound. Crickets chirped, frogs croaked and owls screeched with indignation at having their solitude broken by the invasion of our scent and person. We hurried through the branches and knee high undergrowth, I was glad to be wearing footwear for this, even if they began to rub my toes.

As Dante pushed his way along, the forest did indeed become denser, making it hard going, I should think even harder for the man with his arms full of fox.

"This will have to do." He called back to me. "It's thick enough to cover, and he's starting to wake up. Give me a hand and flatten down a patch of ground for him."

I edged my body around Dante and began to stomp down the undergrowth. He searched around, his eyes darting everywhere. When he spoke again his voice was clipped and terse.
"That'll have to do, now get out of the way."

I put my hands on my hips and stuck my chin out.

"Manners never cost anything."

As he gently placed the animal down, Dante told me off for the second time that night.

"Shut up, you're so spoiled, not everything revolves around you."

"I beg to differ."

"Differ away. The truth hurts."

"What makes you think that you're so much more important than I am, Dante? Because you play Dr Dolittle?"

"I'm not playing, you silly girl, this data will give us the ammunition we need to force the World Union to change the way they treat us, but I wouldn't expect you to care about anyone else but yourself!"

"Oh really? Well if that's what you think then you can go whistle if you want my help from now on. And to think that...."

Our argument was cut short by a gunshot and faint shouting from back in the direction we had come. Dante secured the pen shaped device in his jacket and took me by the arm.

"There's no time for this. Follow me and keep your mouth shut."

He ripped a pathway through the branches, and headed towards a large pine tree. When we made it to its base, he took off his rucksack and pulled out a contraption of belts.

"You'll have to get on my back, Poll."

"I'm sorry?"

Dante fixed the belts around himself until it resembled a harness.

"I said, jump on my back, now."

He appeared more nervous than I'd seen him all night, and it made me wary. As he crouched down I leapt onto his back and wrapped my arms around his neck. He stood straight and took hold of the tree. At some point along our mad dash through the forest, he'd put on some gloves. They were of a kind of velvet material in a caramel colour, that matched the tree bark.

"Hold tight and don't look down. Whatever happens, promise me?"

His tone warned me that this was not the time to argue. So I whispered back into his ear. His hair still smelt of shampoo and damp to my skin.
"I promise."

Then we climbed up. Steadily and carefully, Dante must have been extremely strong to be able to do that with me in tow. Halfway up the bare trunk, he stopped and hugged himself tighter to the tree. There were spikes in his gloves, hooking into the bark, so that's how he did it! I was about to mention my discovery to him, in the form of a smart remark, when I sensed his body stiffening.

The forest had fallen silent. A faint glow of orange daylight rose through the branches. Dante's body rumbled underneath me when he whispered to me, his voice breaking up.
"Close your eyes, Poll."