Pep Squad (9 page)

‘Now your other right leg …'

Jess stepped into the harness and Aidan threaded the waistband around her waist.

‘Just as well putting one of these on wasn't on the entrance exam,' joked Aidan.

Jess liked the attention but wished she didn't always come across as such a klutz around Aidan.

‘When you tighten the belt, make sure you thread it back through the buckle to make it look like a C for closed,' said Lieutenant Parry.

‘If you just thread it through once, the buckle looks like an O. If it's O for open, it can come loose,' said a voice Jess hadn't heard since the welcome assembly. It was Principal Metsen. ‘Good morning, cadets.'

‘Good morning, Principal Metsen,' chorused the cadets.

‘Continue,' he said, nodding at Lieutenant Parry.

Lieutenant Parry paused for the briefest moment before continuing. Jess got the feeling that Metsen rubbed him up the wrong way.

‘There's a carabiner at the front of your harness. Make sure you secure yourself to the rope before attempting any of the exercises today.

‘The rope acts as your safety line and also as your brake. To make things simple, we'll all do this the same way, even you left-handers out there. Hold the rope in front of you with your left hand. This will be above you as you go down the rock. The rope behind you acts as your brake. Hold it in your right hand. When you want to stop, pull it hard to the left. OK?'

The cadets nodded.

‘Would you prefer top or bottom?' Lieutenant Parry asked Principal Metsen.

‘It's your class. I wouldn't want to interfere with the way you run it,' said the principal.

‘I'll take the top, then,' said Lieutenant Parry, setting up the ropes while Principal Metsen put on his climbing harness and helmet. He clipped his carabiner onto one of the ropes that Lieutenant Parry had attached to the stakes in the ground.

‘See you down there,' he said, walking backwards over the cliff, holding the rope in front of him with his left hand and behind him with his right as Lieutenant Parry had shown the cadets.

The cadets peeked over the edge of the cliff to watch. The principal was heading for a wide ledge about ten metres below the top of the cliff. The waves crashed into the cliff wall thirty metres below that, sending a fine mist of sea spray onto the ledge. There was a carved staircase just to the side of the ledge with a handrail that extended all the way from the top of the cliff down to the water. A little further past the staircase the cliffs hollowed into a narrow bay with a small, sandy beach.

When Principal Metsen reached the ledge he landed in a low squat. He threaded the rope through a metal stake hammered into the ledge and called, ‘On belay!'

‘Now it's your turn,' said Lieutenant Parry, smiling at the cadets. ‘Who wants to go first?'

‘I go,' said Svetlana.

‘There are two ways to go down the rock,' Lieutenant Parry explained as he supervised Svetlana securing the rope through her carabiner. ‘You can either walk or you can make a triangle with your legs and bounce off the rock like this,' he continued, demonstrating on the flat ground. ‘You won't be going that fast, but remember to bend your knees when you come back towards the rock. We don't want any broken legs today. When you get to the ledge, squat right down like Principal Metsen did. That'll give the rope some slack and make it easier to unhook yourself. You ready?'

Svetlana took a deep breath and nodded.

‘OK. Hold the rope in front of you with your left hand, behind you with your right, and walk towards the edge.'

‘Backwards?' asked Svetlana.

‘Yep.'

Svetlana backed her way to the edge of the rock.

‘Now what I do?' she asked.

‘Put your heels over the edge and lean back,' said Lieutenant Parry.

‘Like this?' said Svetlana, leaning back until her legs were horizontal and her body was at a forty-five degree angle to the cliff face.

‘That's it,' said Lieutenant Parry. ‘Now either walk down the rock or make a triangle with your legs and bounce.'

Svetlana took off down the rock and reached the bottom in no time.

‘Who's next? Jess?'

Jess clipped her carabiner onto the rope and walked backwards to the edge of the rock. When she got to the very edge, she leant back, drawing the rope firmly behind her to the left. Jess let her body tilt until her legs were horizontal with the ground but her torso was still upright.

‘Lean back a little,' said Lieutenant Parry.

Gradually Jess played out the rope and angled her torso.

‘OK,' said Lieutenant Parry. ‘Down you go.'

Jess took a few tentative steps.

‘Loosen up on the brake,' called Lieutenant Parry.

Still holding the rope tightly, Jess moved it slightly to her right. She then pushed herself off the rock and slid down a bit. It was easier than she had thought. She held the rope further to the right, pushed off with her legs and slid the rest of the way to the bottom.

Principal Metsen helped her unhook herself from the rope with a broad smile, although Jess noticed his eyes weren't smiling. ‘Well done,' he said, pointing her to the stairs. Jess was already halfway up by the time Matt had leaned back over the edge, and he didn't seem to have moved when she got to the top.

Ben sidled over to Matt and made a very soft
bwaark-bwark-bwark-bwark-bwaaark
sound. Matt narrowed his eyes and pushed off.

‘That's it,' said Lieutenant Parry. ‘Keep those legs bent. Loosen up on the brake. You've got it. Who's next?'

Gradually each of the cadets had a turn.

‘This time,' said Lieutenant Parry, setting up another rope, ‘we're going to do it in pairs, racing to the bottom. And please, although it's a race, make sure you concentrate on your landing. I don't want any broken ankles or coccyges. In the case of a tie, the first person to unclip from the rope will be declared the winner, as judged by Principal Metsen. Pair up!'

Matt was absolutely stoked when Svetlana came up to him and asked him to be her partner. Emily just laughed.

‘It's not because she fancies you, she just wants to win.'

‘You keep telling yourself that,' said Matt, clipping himself on to the rope.

Lieutenant Parry blew his whistle and Svetlana was down the cliff and unclipping her carabiner before Matt had even made it over the edge.

Emily laughed herself silly, until she noticed Krivlyakaev laughing just as hard. She glared at him for a few seconds, then a cheeky grin came over her face.

‘What's up?' asked Ben.

‘Just wait till Art class,' said Emily mysteriously. ‘We're up!'

Emily and Ben were toe for toe going down the cliff, but Emily managed to unhook herself fast enough to be declared the winner.

Lauren beat Jess down, no contest.

When all the cadets had regrouped at the top of the cliff, Lieutenant Parry said, ‘Normally when we do this exercise we keep going with the knockout rounds until the fastest abseiler is left, but the stairs are about to get very wet, so we've just got time for some Australian rappelling. Who's up for it?'

‘What's Australian rappelling?' asked Svetlana.

‘Same thing as abseiling but you do it facing forward. Volunteers? Ivan?'

Krivlyakaev smirked, then hooked his harness onto one of the ropes and ran full pelt over the edge of the cliff. By the time the rest of the class had made it to the cliff edge to check on his progress he was unhooked and climbing up the stairs.

‘Come on, Jess. Your turn.'

Lieutenant Parry helped Jess adjust the rope on her harness for the forward run down the cliff.

‘Now, remember, it might look like you're falling–' said Lieutenant Parry.

‘Oh, blimey!' said Matt.

‘–but if you stop running, you'll stop moving downwards. OK?'

‘OK,' said Jess.

Jess walked over to the edge of the cliff and positioned her feet against the top corner. With her legs braced, she lowered her body forward until she was horizontal and looking straight down at the ledge.

‘Everything all right, Jess?' asked Lieutenant Parry.

Jess looked at where Principal Metsen was standing on the ledge below her, and the water below that. It was a lot scarier going forwards, and she wasn't so sure she wanted to do it any more.

‘It's not too late to chicken out,' said Lieutenant Parry.

A couple of the cadets started making clucking noises. That did it. Jess took a deep breath and lifted up one foot. Nothing happened.

‘You're going to have to pull yourself down with your feet,' instructed Lieutenant Parry. ‘Try and get some momentum by running.'

Jess took a few tentative steps. The rope only let her down as far as she pulled. She picked up the pace and ran down the cliff as fast as she could, landing on the ledge on her hands and knees.

‘Quite a rush, eh?' said Principal Metsen, helping Jess to her feet and unbuckling her from the rope.

Jess got the feeling Metsen was sizing her up.

‘Yeah. It's cool. Scary at first, but cool,' she answered.

Principal Metsen held his end of the rope taut.

‘Better move,' he said.

Jess looked up and got a load of sand and gravel in the eyes as Svetlana ran down the cliff.

A few feet before the bottom Svetlana stopped running. Without using her feet to pull herself down the rock, she just hung in midair.

‘Use your feet,' said Principal Metsen.

‘I cannot reach the rock,' she called. ‘Help me.'

Principal Metsen gave Svetlana some more slack on the rope and with a few jerks she made it to the ground, landing on all fours.

‘Next time, don't stop till you get to the bottom,' said the principal.

‘Hmph,' said Svetlana.

Jess was amazed by Svetlana's rudeness, but when she glanced at Principal Metsen he seemed genuinely amused, the corners of his eyes crinkling up that time.

As Jess was climbing the stairs up the cliff, she heard a helicopter. It was very close by. When she got to the top she turned and saw that it was hovering over the ocean, blowing huge concentric ripples over the surface. Then six black-clad figures leapt out of the helicopter, plummeting to the water below.

‘Who's that?' Matt asked.

‘Sophister years,' said Lieutenant Parry. ‘It's a component of their mission-readiness certificate. At random times throughout the year we grab a bunch of them and do something crazy like drop them out of a helicopter in the middle of the ocean. No parachutes. No life jackets. Something for you to look forward to in a couple of years' time.'

‘Great,' said Jess, wondering just how fearless she would need to become over the next three years.

Towards the end of the second week, Jess was starting to feel a bit more on top of things. She was still ridiculously tired, but her body had gone into autopilot and she found she could complete morning Fitness Training without properly waking up, only switching on her brain after breakfast. The study load was incredibly demanding, but apart from Chinese, where she had absolutely no idea what was going on, she liked the secret-agent flavour the classes had to them.

Mathematics, which had a tendency to be dull at her old school, was always more than just about the numbers. The cadets were quickly taught the equations needed to work out complex problems in Physics, including how a cross wind would affect sniper fire and the blast radius of different bombs made of varying weights and types of explosive materials.

Miss Ball even managed to work a spy theme into the Music curriculum: the first two pieces she gave the transition-year orchestra to learn were the theme tunes from the James Bond and Austin Powers movies.

At first Matt was upset at being assigned the piccolo as an instrument, but when he discovered that he had a key solo in ‘Soul Bossa Nova' he, literally, changed his tune. ‘Size doesn't matter, it's what you do with it that counts.'

‘Just keep telling yourself that,' said Emily wickedly, tooting loudly on her bassoon behind him.

Jess was quite happy to be seated next to Aidan in the violin section, and Ben looked like he'd explode with glee, banging loudly on his timpani while Krivlyakaev was limited to the occasional ding on the triangle in the percussion section.

Just about the only class where the cadets did things that weren't secret-agenty was Art. As Jess took out her sketch of a terminator with half its skin hanging off she glanced across at Emily's homework.

‘Is that …?'

‘A hyena,' said Emily. ‘I think it captures Krivan's personality perfectly.'

‘Krivan? You lovebirds have nicknames for each other now?' teased Jess.

‘I refuse to call him by his first name, and his surname's just too much bother. I think it's a good mix,' whispered Emily as Miss Kwan walked around the class, glancing at their sketches and making notes in her marking book.

‘Right, class,' she said when she'd marked everyone's homework. ‘Step two, which we will be doing today, is to make a clay sculpture of your mask on top of one of the positive moulds. Once the clay is dry, you'll make a negative mould of it by pouring a slurry coat of gypsum cement over it, then building that up with burlap strips. Then next week, after you've cleaned the negative mould, we'll pour some gelatin liquid into it, press the second positive facial mould on top and weigh it down. Once that's set, you'll have your prosthetic.'

‘This is going to take forever,' said Emily, kneading a chunk of clay until it became pliable.

Not long into the clay sculpting, Jess was beginning to regret her terminator choice for Aidan's mask. The flap of skin was causing great problems. When it was too thin it broke off, and if it was thick enough to maintain its shape it just didn't look right.

‘How are we going?' said Miss Kwan.

‘Not so well,' said Jess, watching Emily etch fur lines into her perfectly sculpted hyena face.

‘You have set yourself a challenge,' said Miss Kwan. ‘What you can do to maintain the form is use some sculpting wire, like in reinforced concrete. It's giving Aidan's tentacles exactly the right amount of lift.'

‘Oops!' said Emily, accidentally carving across the hyena's snout as she shook with laughter.

Ignoring her, Jess clipped off some lengths of wire and used them to hold the clay in place. She still wasn't happy with the result.

By the time Miss Kwan had finished inspecting everyone's sculptures and making suggestions, the bell rang.

‘Alright, class,' said Miss Kwan, ‘that's all we have time for this week. Please put your sculptures on the drying racks if they are finished, or in the humidicupboard if they still need more work. The Art Room will be open all week during homework hours if you would like to finish them off.'

Most of the class put their sculptures in the humidicupboard. Despite the sculpting wire, the flap of cheek skin fell off Jess's terminator mask when she set it down.

‘Cheer up, Jess,' said Miss Kwan, helping her to reattach the flap of skin. ‘I hear you're doing well in your other subjects. My office is always open between seven and eight in the evening for informal tutoring.'

Jess winced, only then making the connection that her two worst subjects, Chinese and Art, were both taught by Miss Kwan.

Jess continued to struggle in both classes, but she never seemed to have time to make it to any of the informal tutorials. However, she finally got a chance to prove herself in front of Miss Kwan midway through the term. On the morning of the day in question Jess and Emily got to the gym and were surprised to find the door locked and no one else around.

‘Don't tell me Signora Enigmistica overslept and forgot to unlock the gym?' said Matt, coming up behind them.

‘Not just Signora Enigmistica,' said Ben.

‘Oh no,' groaned Emily. ‘You mean this is the one day we actually get to sleep in and nobody told us?'

‘Is that … chit-chat?' said Matt, moving out of Emily's reach as he spoke.

‘I don't think that's it,' said Jess, ignoring Matt and Emily's subsequent hiss. ‘We would have heard if there was a sleep-in, surely. It's not the kind of event you're likely to miss.'

‘This red sign back here is pretty hard to miss too,' said a sophister cadet, tapping on a sheet of paper taped to the wall behind them which said, ‘Pop quiz, rear lawn, 6:30 sharp!'

Jess, Emily and the boys followed the sophister to the rear lawn. The rest of the cadets were already gathered there, along with most of the staff. Unlike the cadets, the staff were relaxed, sipping on coffees and chatting to each other, apart from Signora Enigmistica and Miss Kwan, who stood alone with a stopwatch and whistle at opposite ends of the lawn. The freshmen and sophisters looked serious as they jogged on the spot or did stretching exercises.

‘Maybe we should follow their lead,' said Jess.

They had just started warming up when a whistle blew sharply.

‘Good morning, cadets,' said Signora Enigmistica. ‘We'll be doing something a little different this morning. Those of you who have been at the abbey a while will no doubt be familiar with our physical-education pop quiz.'

The transition years all raised their eyebrows at each other.

‘For those of you who haven't done one of these before, let me explain,' continued Signora Enigmistica. ‘We do a random fitness assessment every so often to measure your physical progress. We time your performance through an assault course. You must clear all the obstacles as instructed. If you fall off an obstacle, you must repeat it until you overcome it successfully. You will start in pairs in reverse alphabetical order, in timed intervals of two minutes. Ward and Tierney, you're up!'

A girl in green and a boy in red walked up to a banner that said
Start
. Traffic cones lined either side of a two-metre-wide course, disappearing into the trees. Signora Enigmistica blew her whistle and the pair began running.

‘Sykes and Sykes!'

Ben and Matt stepped up to the start line and took off towards the trees when Signora Enigmistica blew her whistle.

‘Sweeney and Sullivan!'

Two boys in red uniforms took their place at the start line.

‘It's a shame they don't film it,' Emily said to Jess. ‘I'd like to see how the boys are doing.'

‘I'd like to know what the course is like,' said Jess, shaking out her neck, shoulders and arms to warm up her body as she jogged on the spot.

A number of other pairs were called to compete, then Signora Enigmistica said, ‘McCarthy and Lyons!'

Aidan and Lauren walked to the start line.

‘They're up to the L's. You'll be next,' said Emily, which did nothing to calm Jess's nerves.

‘Lynch and Leclair,' called Signora Enigmistica.

Jess took her place at the start line next to a boy in a green uniform who was the size of a tank. She wondered how long she'd be able to keep up with him, if at all.

Signora Enigmistica blew her whistle and Jess was off, sprinting towards the trees. Just inside the thicket she came to the first obstacle: parallel tyres. Jess hopped nimbly between the tyres, placing her right foot then her left on the ground in the centre of each one. Her rhythm was smooth and she managed to keep up with the freshman as they reached the end together.

The next obstacle was a low net, strung barely a foot above the ground. Cylinders covered in wet purple paint hung down from the net at random intervals. The cadets in front had streaks of purple paint in their hair and on their uniforms as they crawled out the opposite end of the net.

Lynch dived down under the net and Jess followed, getting a faceful of sand. It was only then she noticed the fans either side of the net, which were blowing sand in all directions. Sand blew in her eyes, so she shut them tight and crawled forward on her belly, letting the noise of the fans guide her to the end of the net. Only when the sound of the fans was firmly behind her did Jess open her eyes.

Lynch was already up and running to the next obstacle, an artificial pond. Ropes hung vertically from a bar of wood over the middle of the water. To reach the rope, the cadets had to take a running jump. Ahead of her, Lynch leapt for the rope but it slipped out of his hands and he came splashing down in the middle of the lake. He stood up, waded back to the start and jumped again, grabbing the rope firmly and clearing the lake on his second attempt.

Knowing wet clothing would slow her down, Jess did not make the same mistake. She timed her jump perfectly and grabbed the rope at exactly the right spot, swinging to safety and landing on the platform on the opposite side of the water.

The platform faced a climbing wall. Lynch was already a metre or so up, but his wet clothing was heavy and making the wall slippery. His going was slow and Jess gained on him easily. Inches from the top, Lynch lost his grip and came sliding down the wall towards Jess. Although his foot brushed her upper arm, she held on tightly and managed not to fall.

When she got to the top, a series of pillars stretched out in front of her, like three-metre-high stepping stones. To Jess's surprise, Matt was climbing up one of the pillars, obviously having fallen off previously. Jess mapped out the path of stepping stones in her head, took a deep breath and began, leaping past Matt's pillar easily.

It wasn't until she was halfway across that she realised why he had fallen. Herr Klug was flying a remote-control plane around the pillars, deliberately dive-bombing the competitors. Jess swatted at the plane as it came near her, knocking her off balance. She wobbled wildly, tightening all her core muscles to regain her balance, as the plane circled for another pass. She waited until the plane had passed her by before leaping onto the next pillar. She quickly jumped the remaining pillars and leapt to the ground, landing in a somersault to absorb the impact of the three-metre jump. She sprinted through the trees, gaining on a sophister who had started several minutes ahead of her, and they burst out of the thicket onto the rear lawn in a dead heat.

‘Jess – you did amazingly,' said Miss Kwan with surprise as she clocked Jess's time at the finish line.

As Jess looked for a sunny patch on the grass to stretch out her muscles and cool down, a purple boy loped towards her, his grin revealing purple paint on his teeth.

‘Matt?' said Jess uncertainly as she propped herself up on her elbows.

‘Nope,' said Ben, grinning even wider. ‘He hasn't finished yet.'

‘You beat Matt? That's fantastic!' said Jess, very proud of her friend.

‘Not as fantastic as you,' said Ben. ‘Look.'

He pointed towards the abbey. It was only then that Jess saw the scoreboard up against the wall of the abbey with the names and times of the top ten competitors. Her name was first, a full half minute ahead of the next competitor, and Ben was coming a solid fifth.

‘Looks like all that work in the gym is paying off. Maybe you should thank Krivan–' said Jess, letting out a shriek as a cold dribble of water ran over her head and down her back. She glanced up to see Emily towering over her, wringing out her T-shirt over Jess's head.

‘How's it feel to be the sporty twin?' asked Emily, squeezing a second lot of water from her T-shirt over Ben.

‘Oh, Matt and I aren't competitive,' began Ben. Then he saw the sceptical looks on the girls' faces. ‘OK,' he admitted, smiling more broadly than ever, ‘it feels awesome.'

The names lower down the scoreboard were in constant motion, as more and more cadets finished the course. But Jess was still a good ten seconds ahead of second place.