102 We keep going, having to stop and hide from time to time when people – mostly people who work at Verge’s – come into view, but we’re making good progress. It isn’t till we get to the climbing plants and fruit trees that I feel like something’s changed. A group of about twenty people – some of them wearing the dark-green fleeces with the Verge’s logo on it, and some of them looking like random customers – file down the paths that lead to the front of the garden centre and spread out, each taking a different aisle. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that they’re looking for something.

We’re crouching half under and half in some massive prickly bush as we watch them making their way through the plants. They’re being thorough – checking behind and under everything – which is bad because it means they’ll find us if we stay here, but good because they’re moving slowly. If we’re quick, we can get away before they reach us.

Like she’s read my mind, Kat backs out of the bush and scurries back down an aisle of trees, staying low and quiet. My mouth is as dry as my grandma’s fruit cake, as I push Karim in front of 103 me and we go after Kat. Every second I expect to hear a shout behind me, or feel a hand grabbing my ankle. Running while crouching over and fearing for your life is freaking exhausting and pretty much my whole body feels like it’s on fire.

Out of the fruit trees and through a gate into a staff-only area, and Karim looks like he’s about to drop. I’ve never been in this part of the garden centre before, but Kat seems to know where she’s going. We circle around a toilet block and the industrial skip-like bins until we reach an enormous building with wood-panelled walls and a van-sized shuttered door at the front, which is sealed with a padlock as thick as my leg. Kat shoots past the door and around the side of the building. We just make it into the gap behind her when we hear what sounds like two sets of feet come marching up to the door. I shoot the others a warning look, and press back into the wall. I can’t risk a look, but I can hear clearly enough.

The sound of metal clanking against metal rattles out of the quiet. They must be checking the door.

‘It is secure,’ he says. ‘A human would be unable 104 to break this lock. We must resume our search elsewhere.’

‘It is unlikely that the humans have left the site,’ the second worker says, ‘or the hive would have seen them.’

‘Unlikely but not impossible. They had a head start, and there are many ways in and out of this place.’