Two schoolboys, Czech refugee Pavel 'Soldier' Szolda and local lad Jim Woolcott, get caught up in an international assassination plot after witnessing a crime, leading to a tense cat-and-mouse chase across Northern England.
Teenage Czech refugee Istvan Szolda (nicknamed 'Soldier') overhears an assassination plot. Distraught and disbelieved, Soldier persuades his only friend, local boy Jim Wilcott, to accompany him, late at night, to the execution site.
The duo break into and hide as the henchmen and later, cripple arrive. They overhear an argument and the cripple is shot. They manage to escape and call the police but a further surprise awaits them that will change their lives forever
Aware that the villains know where they live, Soldier and Jim are in fear for their lives. The police dismiss their story as a time-wasting hoax, and one of the henchman, known as Smiler, finds them, forcing the boys to make a desperate decision.
The boys go on the lam North hoping to reach refuge with a friend of Jim's. However, they're hotly pursued by Smiler and the rest of the gang and are forced to cut their plan short by jumping off their train in the middle of nowhere.
Lost, cold and hungry, Soldier and Jim shelter in an abandoned quarry where they find an OS map and try to navigate a route to safety. Meanwhile, the gang relentlessly pursue them to the point of exhaustion.
The gang have put the word out that the boys are borstal escapees. The ruse works when a farmer rings them after scaring the boys from his hayloft. Exhausted but with refuge within reach, Soldier and Jim are unaware how close the gang is.
The boys make it to the refuge of their friend's farm, only to discover it's the wrong one. The owner takes pity and gives them some food but secretly he too has heard of the runaways and calls the gang.
The boys are captured and taken to a secret location to await their fate where another shock is in store. Meanwhile, the farmer's wife starts having second thoughts about their identities.
As the truth about the cripple and his connection to the gang is revealed and with no one knowing where they are, Soldier and Jim realise that their fate is doomed.