in his trouser pocket made a double bleep.
‘Yeah,’ James said.
Mr Pike sounded like he was running. ‘James, Dana, I’m down, but I’ve had a peek through my binoculars. I can see a chute a couple of hundred metres ahead of you and there’s nothing going on beneath it. Leave your equipment and get over there.’
When James first looked around, all the chutes had been in a similar state. Now, one billowed conspicuously, tethered to the ground by the weight of the trainee wearing it. As James set off, he was aware of Dana racing up behind him. She was a triathlete and by the time he was half-way towards the stricken jumper Dana had passed him in a blaze of flying sand.
The wind was light and Dana found a ten-year-old girl tangled in cords and nylon.
‘Jo, sweetheart, what happened?’
James arrived as Dana peeled away the layers of fabric. At first Dana assumed that Jo McGowan was unconscious, but she was just in mild shock. James recoiled when he saw that Jo’s boot was twisted at a weird angle. She’d clearly broken a bone.
‘What happened?’ Mr Pike puffed, as he stopped running beside James.
James kicked at a chunk of reinforced concrete lying on the sand. ‘Looks like she hit this as she came down and turned over on her ankle.’
Mr Pike shook his head as he looked around at acres of level sand. ‘We surveyed this beach,’ he said bitterly. ‘It’s gotta be a million to one that you hit something.’
It looked as if Jo was fine apart from her ankle, but Dana didn’t want to move the trainee until she was completely sure. She unfolded a toothed blade from her multi-tool and hacked the parachute harness away from the youngster’s shoulders.
‘Does it hurt anywhere else?’ Dana asked.
Jo shook her head as she struggled to sit up. ‘Maybe it’s sprained,’ she sniffed. ‘Maybe I can walk it off.’
But Jo knew better when she saw the way her boot was pointing in the wrong direction. Jo was a sweet-faced girl with long black hair, but James had the misfortune to see the moment when her heart broke. After ninety-six days of training, she was devastated.
Jo was athletic, bright, a natural leader and as close as you ever get to a cert to pass basic training. But she’d been done in by debris washed up on the last tide and you’re not allowed to resume basic training. When the ten-year-old recovered she’d have to restart from day one.
Dana gave Jo a tight hug and spoke comfortingly, reminding her that she was young and that nobody would blame her for failing, but Jo’s future had just imploded and there was no consoling her.
Meanwhile, Mr Pike was burrowing into Jo’s backpack, throwing equipment into the sand until he came across a red wallet containing a first-aid kit.
‘We need to get that boot off before the ankle swells,’ Mr Pike explained, as he slid out a syringe containing local anaesthetic. ‘But that’s gonna hurt, so I’ll numb it off first.’
Although Jo’s injury was serious, it was treatable. Mr Pike sounded much calmer now that he was getting a grip on things. He worked expertly, slicing a hole in the leg of Jo’s padded jump suit before swabbing the patch of skin underneath with alcohol and telling her to look away before pushing the needle into her leg.
‘It’ll take a minute to go numb, but you’ll be a lot more comfortable after that.’
Meanwhile, Mr Kazakov and the other trainees had folded their chutes up and were rushing over to see what was going on. The youngsters babbled about how bad it looked until Mr Pike lost patience with their noise.
‘You all have orders and a rendezvous point for twenty-one hundred hours,’ he shouted. ‘Training doesn’t stop just because one of you is injured. If you don’t make it by twenty-two hundred you’ll not be getting dinner, so I strongly suggest that you prepare your equipment and set off towards your first marker points.
‘Mr Kazakov, organise the collection of the parachutes and jump clothing and stow it on the boat for the ride back to the mainland.’
As Dana continued to comfort Jo and Mr Pike began picking the lace out of her boot, all of the trainees except Kevin Sumner began peeling off their padded jump suits, revealing tanned skin and lightweight jungle clothing.
‘Sumner, why are you standing there?’ Mr Kazakov shouted, as he faced Kevin off. ‘You’re getting on my tits today. I can see you ending