Free Inkers by Alex Rudall

hardly felt it. Suddenly, close to the left, she heard Tom shout “Lily!” and turned to see him, just twenty metres away through the trees. He had caught her, somehow —she turned right and ran on, upwards again, falling and scrambling up and tapping the watch again and again, No Signal , No Signal .
    She came out from the trees onto a hillside covered in grey stones and dark green ferns. Unable to go any further, she threw herself down behind a large rock that would hide her for a moment, and checked once more. The orange screen of the Front Forum filled her vision. There was a little bar in the top right which said Signal next to it. It was about half–full at the moment, but the bar seemed to be decreasing steadily.
    She took a deep breath and then shoved herself up and stumbled further through the bracken, following a narrow sheep path, slipping once on slick mud and catching herself painfully on one hand. She ducked behind a gorse bush and crouched down to check once more. There was still a signal but it was still decreasing at the same steady rate. She looked towards Scotland. How could it be decreasing? Then she saw it, the sailing boat with a tall mast, sailing hard up the Firth. She knew suddenly without any doubt that the boat was the source of the signal, and that soon it would be out of range. It looked peaceful, pushing into the haze to the north.
    She peered again at the screen. “Open last post,” she said, and obediently her Help message appeared. There had been no other responses. “Uh, add the photo,” she said.
    Text popped up in front of her — which photo? . The signal bar was still shrinking steadily. She had only seconds.
    “Last photo,” she said. “The last photo I took.”
    The photo of the ink barn appeared and shrank to fit into the text field.
    “OK, send it. Send it now!” she said, as the signal bar approached nothing.
    For a moment the colour behind the photo changed to grey, and then it moved down underneath the last message. Almost at the same moment No Signal covered the screen. She let out the breath she had been holding. She didn’t know what frightened her more —the thought that it had not worked, or the thought that it had. She looked away, blinking, to get the screen out of her eyes.
    Brian was looming over her, blocking the sunlight, his pale face a mask of rage. She flinched back into the bush, covering the watch with her hand.
    “Give it to me,” he snarled. He grabbed her arm and tore the watch from her, snapping its wristband. He glared at it.
    “That’s mine!” she said.
    He was breathing hard, frowning down at her. “Did you get a signal?” he asked.
    “No,” she said. “No, no, I was just looking, there was no signal.” Brian frowned and tapped at the watch in his hand. The orange squares appeared in his eyes. After a moment, he nodded. “Good,” he said.
    He bent and placed the watch on the large flat stone beneath him, squared off and stamped on it. She heard the crunch as the screen shattered. As he stamped again Lily flinched away, pulling her knees up to protect herself. Tears ran down her face. She brushed them away roughly with the back of her hand. Thin clouds rushed past overhead. Brian continued with energy, veins straining from his neck, his face strangely blotchy, white and red, his hands clenched in fists, stamping until the watch had completely disintegrated. Finally one by one he picked up the little parts of plastic and metal and glass and pushed them into the pocket of his jacket. Then he pulled Lily violently to her feet and hauled her back towards the path. In the distance Lily could just see the tall–masted boat rising and falling slightly on the swell, its white sail full.
    They were halfway down the mountain by the time Lily realised that nowhere in the message had she mentioned her location.
    Brian searched her pockets, took the pregnancy test and locked her in an empty storeroom in the older part of the farmhouse. The only