Man vs. Beast

  ‘Still counts,’ Callum said, glowering at Bruce. ‘She e-mails me almost every day. Who have you ever snogged?’

  ‘I’ve kissed girls.’

  James laughed. ‘Like who?’

  ‘Not here,’ Bruce said. ‘Out on missions and stuff.’

  Everyone groaned because they didn’t believe him: Bruce was shy around girls.

  ‘He snogs that little blue teddy he always sleeps with,’ Shak giggled.

  ‘Piss off,’ Bruce said angrily. ‘And I don’t sleep with Jeremy. He fell off that shelf over my bed one time and Kyle went and told the whole world.’

  ‘What the hell kind of name is Jeremy for a teddy?’ James smirked.

  ‘Yeah,’ Connor nodded. ‘You’d at least think he’d snog a teddy with a girl’s name.’

  Bruce exploded out of his seat and glowered at Connor. ‘Wanna try repeating that in five seconds when I’ve punched all your teeth out?’

  James backed up his chair and grinned at his mates as he stood up. ‘I’ll leave you four pussies to sort your squabbles. I’d better be in my room when Kerry comes knocking.’

  ‘You reckon?’ Shak said. ‘That’s really gonna happen when she just cracked you one.’

  ‘I happen to have an ace up my sleeve,’ James grinned. ‘Little Miss Perfect is failing algebra. She needs my massive brain to sort out her Xs and Ys.’

  Connor tutted. ‘You’re totally jammy, James. You always get lucky with girls.’

  James looked smug as he walked away from the table. ‘What can I say guys? Chicks can’t resist me – they’re putty in my hands.’

  *

  James went up to his room, stepped over the dirty laundry and sat on his double bed reading the copy of Great Expectations his English teacher had inflicted on him. He was supposed to be two hundred and fifty pages in already, but he was mired in the low seventies and couldn’t concentrate because he expected Kerry to knock at any minute.

  But he was having doubts by the time he reached page 106 and when a knock finally came, it was a triple.

  ‘Lauren?’ James yelled, as his sister’s long blonde hair dangled inside the door.

  ‘Ha-haa,’ Lauren smiled, pointing at James as she stepped into the room. ‘Your face is well red. Kerry said she gave you a good stinging.’

  James slid his bookmark in and straightened himself up. ‘You saw Kerry? Is she coming over?’

  ‘Doubt it,’ Lauren said. ‘She’s just been up in my room getting help with her maths homework.’

  ‘You little traitor,’ James gasped. ‘What did you do that for? I’m way better at maths than you.’

  ‘She’s in a right mood with you, James. And I might not be as good at maths as you, but I still get all As and I’m ahead of Kerry. Anyway, it serves you right for cracking a sexist joke.’

  ‘Shak told the joke, I barely laughed.’

  ‘Whatever,’ Lauren shrugged. ‘You and Kerry are such drama queens. It’ll be hands all over each other again by tomorrow.’

  ‘So, did you just come here to gloat about me getting slapped?’

  Lauren grinned. ‘Came to ask a favour, actually.’

  ‘Sounds ominous.’

  Lauren sat on the edge of the bed. ‘You know Kirsten McVicar?’

  James shook his head.

  ‘Yes you do, James. She was at my birthday party. She’s Bethany’s friend, but she’s a year younger. She was wearing those black tights with the green spots on?’

  ‘Nah,’ James said. ‘Your mates all talk the same crap and you’re always swapping clothes. Why’s it matter anyway?’

  ‘Kirsten dropped out of basic training last week. And you know Bethany’s brother Jake is doing his training as well?’

  James nodded. ‘How’s the little dude getting on?’

  ‘Kirsten says Jake’s struggling. He’s only just turned ten. He’s sprained his thumb and he’s not exactly huge for his age, so he’s having a hard time carrying his pack on long runs and stuff.’

  ‘Pity,’ James said. ‘I hope Jake doesn’t fail. He’s a bit full of himself at times, but—’

  ‘Pot calling kettle if ever I heard it,’ Lauren interrupted. ‘Anyway, me and Bethany made up a plan to give Jake a boost. We want to take him a little pick-me-up package. You know, chocolate bars for energy, dry boots and underwear, a padded strap to make carrying his pack easier.’

  James looked shocked. ‘Lauren, you can’t just waltz into the basic training compound. The gates are alarmed and there’s barbed wire and surveillance cameras everywhere.’

  ‘Me and Bethany have it all worked out, but we could do with someone older coming with us.’

  ‘No, no, no!’ James laughed. ‘Don’t look at me. We’ll get hammered if we’re caught. Jake’s a nice little kid, but he’ll just have to suffer through basic training, same as we all did.’

  ‘Please, James.’

  ‘Besides, why do you care? I mean, I can see Bethany would want to risk her neck for her little brother, but you? I’ve never heard you say a good word about Jake. You battered him that time he blocked your toilet up with popcorn.’

  ‘Bethany’s my best friend. I’m doing it for her.’

  ‘Hang on,’ James gasped, as his face lit up with realisation. ‘You’re not doing this for Jake at all. Lover boy’s in training as well, isn’t he? You’re doing this for Rat.’

  ‘No,’ Lauren gasped. ‘I mean, Rat is Jake’s training partner. But he’s not my boyfriend.’

  ‘Look Lauren, I know you’ve got the hots for Rat, but I’m on top of everything now. All my homework is up to date and my grades aren’t bad. I must have spent a thousand hours running punishment laps and scrubbing toilets since I came to CHERUB. I’m not sticking my neck out for anyone unless it’s life and death.’

  ‘I thought you might say that,’ Lauren grinned. ‘So I’ll have to call in the favour.’

  ‘What favour? I don’t owe you squat.’

  James felt his heart jolt as Lauren gave him her evil smirk. Her face had altered since she was a toddler, but that expression hadn’t changed a bit. It was the look she used to get right before jamming an ice-cream cornet in your face. It was the look she had when she broke the video and told their mum she saw James do it …

  ‘Remember last year, when we were in Idaho?’ Lauren said airily. ‘Remember cheating on Kerry with a girl called Becky?’

  James nodded grimly.

  ‘I never told anyone; but, I mean, that information could slip out at any time and Kerry would kick your arse. So, I just want one little favour in return for eternal silence.’

  ‘You what?’ James yelled. ‘That’s not asking for a favour, that’s blackmail.’

  ‘I suppose you could call it that,’ Lauren smirked. ‘But James, you like Rat, you like Jake. Is it really such a big problem?’

  ‘What kind of scumbag blackmails their own brother?’ James asked indignantly.

  Lauren ducked the question. ‘James, me and Bethany have everything planned out. There’s no way we’ll get caught.’

  ‘You know what,’ James said, trying to sound confident, ‘I’m calling your bluff. That thing with Becky happened more than a year ago and Kerry knows I’m no angel. She’ll understand.’

  Lauren grinned as she headed for the door. ‘Fine, I’ll go tell Kerry about Becky now then.’

  James acted casual as Lauren headed out into the corridor and turned towards Kerry’s room, but he couldn’t keep up the act and scrambled after her.

  Kerry’s room was less than twenty metres away and Lauren was all set to knock by the time he’d caught up.

  ‘OK, you win,’ James whispered bitterly.

  Lauren smiled contentedly. ‘Thought I might.’

  James huffed, ‘But you can’t keep blackmailing me. You’ve got to swear on our mum’s grave never to tell anyone.’

  ‘That’s fair,’ Lauren nodded. Then she broke into a grin and gave her brother a hug. ‘Thanks, James.’

  James was too piss
ed off to hug Lauren back, but he did have a grudging admiration for her cheek. Then Kerry’s door popped open.

  ‘Thought I could hear you two,’ Kerry said. ‘What’s going on out here?’

  ‘Nothing,’ James said unconvincingly.

  Lauren smiled at Kerry. ‘I told this idiot to come and apologise to you.’

  James was relieved to see that Kerry was smiling back at him. ‘Guess I overreacted,’ she said.

  James shrugged. ‘Sorry I laughed at that joke.’

  ‘I’ll live,’ Kerry said as she stepped up and kissed James on the cheek. ‘Did I hear you say you were behind on Great Expectations earlier?’

  ‘Page one-twelve,’ James nodded.

  ‘That’s further than me,’ Kerry said. ‘I’m never gonna catch up, so I got the film version out of the library. You want to come in and watch it?’

  ‘Lifesaver,’ James grinned, as he stepped into Kerry’s room. Then he looked back at Lauren. ‘Catch up with you later, sis.’

  ‘I’ll send you a text with the details,’ Lauren said. ‘Don’t be late.’

  Kerry looked a bit confused. ‘What’s she up to?’

  James moved in to kiss Kerry back. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ he grinned, as he looped his arm around her back and kicked the door shut with his trainer.

  3. DARK

  Angst kept James awake and he rolled out of bed a few minutes before the 2 a.m. alarm. He put on clothes that would make him hard to see in the dark: navy blue tracksuit with a baseball cap and black Adidas trainers.

  Lauren and her best mate Bethany were waiting for him six floors down in a crawl space under the fire stairs.

  ‘Thanks so much for coming,’ Bethany grinned. ‘I don’t know how Lauren persuaded you. I never thought you’d agree in a million years.’

  ‘No worries,’ James said sourly, as he scowled at his sister.

  James couldn’t stand Bethany. She was intelligent and funny, but her mocking tone and giggling fits drove him nuts.

  ‘Are you sure nobody saw you sneak down here?’ Lauren asked.

  James shrugged. ‘Not as far as I can tell.’

  ‘Cool,’ Lauren said. ‘The shooting range is next to the training compound, so if we get stopped, we’ll say we’ve been assigned to a mission and we’re heading off to sign out some stun guns.’

  ‘That’s only gonna work if it’s someone who doesn’t know us,’ James pointed out.

  ‘Yeah,’ Bethany said. ‘But how many people are gonna be wandering around campus at this time of the morning?’

  ‘S’pose,’ James said. ‘So what’s our plan?’

  ‘The less time we’re out of our beds, the less chance that we’ll get noticed,’ Lauren said. ‘So I’ll explain as we run. Grab that pack and get moving.’

  ‘Are you sure this fire door isn’t alarmed?’ James asked, as he reached towards a large blue backpack.

  Lauren shook her head. ‘Have some faith, bro. Me and The Bethster have every detail worked out.’

  James felt his shoulder sag as he hooked the pack over his arms. ‘Christ, I thought we were taking them a few bits of food and stuff. What’s in here, lead weights?’

  ‘Me and Lauren have the clean clothes and food,’ Bethany explained. ‘You’re carrying all our equipment: wire cutters, electrical tools and three sets of waders.’

  ‘We’re the brains, you’re the muscle,’ Lauren grinned, as she pushed the fire door open. It was early summer, but the air still had a nip to it at this time of the morning. There was no alarm and Lauren looked back at her brother as if to say I told you so.

  Knowing their packs would jangle if they ran, the three kids kept to a brisk walk. They cut across a squelchy corner of a football pitch, before heading into the woods that covered all of the undeveloped areas on CHERUB campus. After dealing with a tangle of undergrowth, their feet found a dirt path.

  ‘This takes longer than walking across the open fields, but nobody uses this trail except for running cross-country,’ Lauren explained.

  ‘And if we do come across anyone, we can use the trees as cover,’ Bethany added.

  James felt slightly reassured: the girls had obviously put in a lot of thought.

  Once they were clear of the buildings, Lauren broke into a jog. But they couldn’t run fast because the moonlight penetrating the branches was barely enough to make out the path. James moved up alongside his sister.

  ‘We’re going right up to the back of campus,’ Lauren continued, breathing heavily. ‘Remember when me and Kyle were on punishment and had to dig out all those ditches?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘Most of them carry water off the farms that surround campus. They all feed into the stream that runs across the training compound. In a couple of places we cleared out ditches that join the stream inside the training compound. All that stops you getting in is a few strands of barbed wire and we can easily snip that.’

  ‘Before you ask, we’ve checked and it’s not electrified or alarmed,’ Bethany added.

  ‘What about video cameras?’ James asked. ‘They’re everywhere. The instructors know if a squirrel farts inside that compound.’

  ‘There’s fifty-three cameras,’ Lauren nodded. ‘But they all run off a single circuit. If we pull the fuse the whole lot stops working.’

  ‘How’d you find that out?’

  ‘Martin Newman got punishment, cleaning out the administration building,’ Bethany said. ‘We sweet-talked him into making a copy of the electrical plans for the whole of campus.’

  Lauren giggled. ‘And now you’ve got to go to the cinema with him.’

  ‘Shut up,’ Bethany gasped. ‘Don’t you worry. I know I promised, but I’ll find a way to wriggle out of it.’

  ‘Martin’s gonna be so gutted,’ Lauren said. ‘Doesn’t it crack you up the way one of his ears sticks out and one doesn’t?’

  ‘You can’t talk, Lauren. You fancy Rat and he’s no oil painting.’

  Both girls were giggling at their little in-jokes, which irritated James.

  ‘Make some more noise, why don’t you?’ he sneered.

  ‘There’s nobody around,’ Lauren said dismissively, but both girls realised they were being dumb and calmed down.

  *

  It took ten minutes’ jogging along the winding path to reach the back of the training compound. The three kids had slowly increased their speed as their eyes adjusted to the moonlight.

  They were in good shape and none of the trio was seriously out of breath as they pulled up beside a ditch that was about a metre and a half deep. Lauren slid a torch out the back of her jeans and shone it around.

  ‘This is the spot,’ she whispered. ‘James, get the waders out.’

  James was relieved as he slipped the weight off his shoulders and unzipped the pack. It hadn’t rained in a week, so they could find some hard ground to change their footwear, but they’d passed through a couple of boggy areas and their trainers were coated in mud.

  After throwing two smaller sets of booted rubber trousers at the girls, James caught a whiff of feet as he wriggled the waders up his legs and hooked the straps that held them up over his shoulders.

  ‘Where’d you get these?’ James moaned. ‘They’re nasty.’

  ‘Kyle had them when he was on punishment,’ Bethany explained. ‘He wore them every day for six weeks, so I’m not surprised they’re a bit ripe.’

  ‘Once you get down in that ditch, Kyle’s smell is the last thing you’ll worry about,’ Lauren said, as she threw something at James.

  He narrowly missed the catch, but realised it was a head-mounted lamp as soon as he picked it off the ground.

  ‘The light’s good for fifty metres, but don’t use it any more than you have to,’ Lauren said.

  James slipped the elastic strap around his head and quickly flipped the tiny LED bulbs on and off to make sure they were working. Bethany was still struggling to get into her waders and Lauren sorted her out while James hooked on what was now a m
uch lighter pack and set off towards the ditch.

  He considered jumping into the muddy water, but it would splash up his arms and make a racket, so he took a cautious approach, sitting on the edge of the ditch with his legs dangling and gently lowering himself down.

  There was a squelch as his waders sank into the twenty centimetres of mud that lay beneath the stagnant, thigh-high water. As his feet settled, James rested his palm against the clayish soil of the embankment to steady himself.

  By this time, the girls stood atop the embankment and Bethany looked flustered.

  ‘Maybe we shouldn’t,’ she said anxiously.

  James rose to the tantalising possibility of Lauren’s hair-brained scheme being called off.

  ‘Maybe you’re right,’ he said, perhaps a little too eagerly. ‘This is risky and the instructors are bound to punish Jake and Rat as well if we’re caught.’

  ‘We didn’t come this far to quit,’ Lauren said stiffly.

  Bethany nodded apprehensively. ‘Lauren’s right – I always get the jitters.’

  Lauren scowled at James. ‘And don’t you encourage her.’

  James stared gloomily at the water as the two girls held hands and slipped down the embankment together. Bethany looked a touch wobbly as she took her first steps, but Lauren had months of wading experience under her belt and led off at a pace James and Bethany struggled to cope with.

  It was less than ten metres from the spot where the path met the ditch to the tangle of barbed wire at the back of the training compound, but James’ thighs already ached from pushing his legs through the swirling mud.

  Lauren flipped on her head lamp to inspect the zigzagging strands of barbed wire. She tried pushing them, but they were taut.

  ‘They’ve reinforced it since I was down here on punishment,’ Lauren whispered anxiously. ‘I hoped we’d be able to push the wires down and make a gap big enough to step through, but we’ll need to cut it.’

  James turned his back to Lauren so she could unzip his pack and grab the chunky set of wire cutters from inside.

  ‘You know this is vandalism of CHERUB property?’ James said. ‘If they catch us, we’re in serious trouble.’

  Lauren sounded annoyed. ‘Stop moaning, James. I’m trying to think.’