Secret Army - Robert Muchamore Page 0,19

stay up and keep moving.

Little triumphs like this made training exhilarating. Paul was much stronger and fitter than when the training programme began two and a half months earlier, but no amount of effort saved him from being the youngest and weakest of the six trainees in Group A.

As Paul neared the lake the slope eased and the icy water rose as high as his waist. The lake was over a hundred metres across. Paul’s path was a quarter that distance and marked out by a taut length of rope hovering a few centimetres above the lapping water.

The rocks in Paul’s kit bag made swimming impossible, so the crossing was a test of his slender arms. Paul plunged on until the near-freezing water reached his neck. He turned backwards and grabbed the rope with both hands, then pulled up his legs and wrapped them around the rope.

This left him hanging off the rope with most of his body submerged and the bag of rocks pulling him down. If he let go he’d plunge to the bottom of the lake and risk drowning if he didn’t free the backpack and kick his way to the surface.

Going along the rope strained Paul’s hands, but the really hard work was done by his stomach muscles. The technique was to shuffle your knees forward as far as your wrists, then clamp your legs tightly around the rope and push forwards with your thighs and stomach while moving hand over hand.

None of the trainees had mastered this technique quickly. In the early days they regularly fell off, even when crossing half the current distance with no weight on their backs. Paul was in agony before he was even halfway across, but once you’re suspended over several metres of near-freezing water there’s no alternative to carrying on.

‘Get some speed up!’ Khinde urged, as he took an easier route around the edge of the lake. ‘Don’t stop. Fight the pain.’

After two excruciating minutes, Paul peered down and saw that he was in shallow water. He clutched his stomach and was almost doubled over as he staggered up the muddy embankment at the side of the lake.

‘You’re a fighter,’ Khinde said encouragingly, as he reached out and gave Paul an extremely welcome tug.

A few metres beyond the lake’s edge was a hand cart with rocks mounded on its wooden platform. Paul exhaled with delight and exhaustion as he pushed the kit bag off his shoulders and tipped out the rocks.

He was breathless and soaking wet, but running felt a hundred times easier without the rocks on his back, and from here he’d be back in the warmth of the school building within ten minutes.

CHAPTER TEN

Paul was used to finishing last. He came into the school building through the emergency exit at the back of the hall and found Rosie, PT and Joel stripped down to muddy underclothes and sitting close to the radiators holding enamel mugs filled with tea.

‘Hot cuppa?’ Joel’s ten-year-old brother Sam asked, as Paul hitched his sodden rugby shirt over his head.

‘Yeah, fantastic,’ Paul nodded, squelching as he sat in the doorway and pulled off his boots. ‘I’ll grab it in a second, but I’m busting for a piss.’

Paul raced up, taking two steps at a time. His olive trousers were dripping and he was leaving damp sock prints up the staircase that would enrage Takada if he got caught.

He decided to get a cloth and wipe them on his way down, but for now he was consumed by a burning bladder. He cut into the boys’ bathroom and groaned with relief as steaming yellow pee blasted the back of the urinal.

‘So beautiful!’ Paul told himself. ‘Ahh!’

The cistern flushed in the stall directly behind and Luc emerged. He’d stripped down to his shorts after the training run and his torso bulged in all the places where Paul wished his did.

The instant Luc saw Paul, he looked left and right to make sure no one was around before charging forwards and splattering him against the wall.

‘Bugger off,’ Paul moaned, as Luc clamped a beefy hand around the back of Paul’s neck and squished his cheeks out of shape.

Luc put his lips close to Paul’s ear and spoke slowly. ‘How’s my new training partner?’

‘I’m not scared of you,’ Paul said unconvincingly, as he tried not to inhale Luc’s rank breath.

‘I’m gonna slam you down on that training mat,’ Luc said menacingly, as he pinned Paul’s chest against the wall with one knee and gripped his slender wrist