you going soft like that again I’ll have you running this assault course tomorrow.’
Andy should have cleared the beam already, but it takes a few seconds to compose yourself after you stop and Bruce’s second shot came around in a circular arc. The bag smashed into Andy just as he got his balance back and started moving again.
‘Bull’s-eye!’ Bruce shouted triumphantly.
As Lauren made a three-metre jump on to the muddy crash-mat at the end of her beam, Andy clattered through a canopy of overhanging branches and hit the pond below. After a big splash, Andy grabbed a branch and hauled himself out of the brown soup, but as he lunged forward a horrific pain shot down his chest, making him cry out.
The water was two metres deep and the bottom of the pond had a cushioned lining to prevent serious accidents, but Andy’s face was screwed up in agony as he staggered towards the embankment. James and Bruce climbed down the rope ladder from their platform, then held their bare arms up high as they navigated the tangle of stinging nettles surrounding the water.
‘What are you whinging about, Lagan?’ James asked.
‘Cracked rib or something,’ Andy gasped. ‘It’s absolute agony, all down my right side.’
Up above, Jake Parker and his mate Ewan had made it up the slope at the start of their third circuit. They didn’t get push-ups because Miss Speaks was looking down at Andy and they didn’t get hit by the heavy bags because James and Bruce were guiding him through the stinging nettles.
Jake grinned at Lauren when he jumped off the beam, with Ewan coming off the next beam a few steps behind.
‘Looks like it’s our lucky day,’ Jake chirped, giving Lauren a cheeky wink. ‘What happened to your boyfriend?’
Lauren was sick of Jake and this was more than she could take. She made sure Miss Speaks wasn’t looking before grabbing Jake’s earlobe and twisting hard.
‘First off, he’s not my boyfriend,’ Lauren growled. ‘Second, if you’d behaved this morning I’d be sitting in a nice air-conditioned Art class right now. So stop smiling and start walking, because I’m this close to kicking the snot out of you.’
‘I’m so scared of you,’ Jake taunted, but only after Lauren had let go and he was well out of range.
On the opposite side of the lake Miss Speaks stared down at the three boys. ‘Is he really hurt?’ she asked suspiciously.
‘Looks like it,’ Bruce shouted up, as two more boys raced across the beams overhead.
Speaks shook her head and sighed dramatically. ‘OK, James, you take the little worm to the medical unit and get him looked at. But I’m gonna be checking in with Dr Kessler, Andy. If you’re faking, I’ll have you back here for a special one-on-one training session that’ll make this seem like a Buckingham Palace garden party.’
5. CASCADE
CHERUB campus has a small medical centre with six private rooms and a five-bed casualty ward. Andy lay at the far end of the well equipped ward, while an eight-year-old who’d burned her hand on a cake tin sat at the other end feeling sorry for herself.
Andy sat up, wincing with pain, as two men came through the swing doors. They were similar in appearance, with bald heads and silver-framed glasses. One was Dr Kessler, who Andy had been expecting for almost an hour. The other man was the mission controller John Jones, who he wasn’t expecting at all.
Kessler had worked on campus for more than twenty years, but his German accent never faltered.
‘Good news, I think,’ he said, reaching across Andy’s bed and peeling off his covers to examine his chest. ‘I checked the X-ray and there’s no break, but you’ve got some nice bruises coming up. I just want you to try raising your left shoulder off the pillow.’
Andy barely lifted his shoulder before he hissed with pain and slumped back on to his pillow.
Dr Kessler looked at John Jones. ‘He’s pulled a muscle. It’s probably the most common injury I see: the kids train hard and muscle is much more susceptible to damage when heavily fatigued.’
Andy looked at Dr Kessler. ‘But I should be OK for my mission on Saturday, shouldn’t I?’
John cut Andy off. ‘I had a text message from Greg Rathbone about ninety minutes ago. George Lydon has to visit his aunt’s house on Saturday, so he’s moved the sleepover forward to tonight.’
‘Damn,’ Andy tutted.
‘Why didn’t you tell Zara that you had an important mission coming up?’ John asked.
‘I didn’t want Lauren and them