CHERUB: Class A

by Robert Muchamore

  2. STINGING

  Fired from close range, the next paintball knocked James backwards on to the concrete floor. Kerry Chang kept the gun on him as she closed in. James had his hands in the air.

  ‘I surrender.’

  ‘Pardon?’ Kerry said, blasting a fourth paintball into James’ thigh.

  It wasn’t going to do permanent damage but, fired from close range, the paintballs had left him in a heap on the ground.

  ‘Kerry, please, not again,’ James gasped. ‘That really hurts.’

  ‘Pardon?’ Kerry said. ‘Can’t hear what you’re saying.’

  She stood astride James, pointing the muzzle of the paintball gun at him. On the other side of the car, Bruce screamed as Gabrielle shot him a couple more times.

  Kerry fired into James’ stomach from less than a metre away, doubling him over.

  ‘You mad cow,’ James howled. ‘You could have my eye out doing that. You’re supposed to stop shooting as soon as I surrender.’

  ‘Did you surrender?’ Kerry grinned. ‘I misheard. I thought you said, Please shoot me again.’

  The girls rested their guns on the roof of the car.

  ‘Did we whip your little pink butts?’ Gabrielle whooped in her thick Jamaican accent. ‘Or did we whip your little pink butts?’

  James struggled to sit up, clasping his hands over his stomach. The pain was bad, but losing to the girls on a stupid training exercise hurt a hundred times more.

  The powered garage door started rolling upwards. A huge man stood silhouetted against the moonlight. It was Norman Large, CHERUB’s head training instructor. He had the rottweiler on a leash at his side.

  ‘Well done, ladies,’ Mr Large shouted. ‘You’ve distinguished those pretty little heads on this one.’

  Kerry and Gabrielle smiled. Mr Large stopped walking when his size fifteen boots were almost touching James’ leg. James put his hand over his face, shielding his nose from the growling dog’s rank breath.

  ‘That thing’s not gonna bite me, is it?’ James asked.

  Mr Large laughed. ‘Luckily for you and Bruce, Thatcher has been trained to pin a man to the ground and never bite. Her brother, Saddam, now that’s a different question. He’s trained to sink his teeth in. We’d have been picking chunks of flesh off the lawn if you’d been up against Saddam. Unfortunately, the chairman banned me from using him … Anyway, James, get on your feet. Gabrielle, help that other little idiot to stand up.’

  Bruce limped around the car, using the bonnet for support. The yellow paint from Gabrielle’s gun trickled down his legs. Both boys stood with their backs against the car. Mr Large hollered right in their faces:

  ‘Tell me everything you did wrong.’

  ‘I’m… not sure really,’ James shrugged.

  Bruce looked down at the floor.

  ‘Let’s start at the beginning,’ Mr Large bawled. ‘Why did it take you so long to reach the villa?’

  ‘We jogged all the way,’ James said.

  ‘Jogged?’ Mr Large shouted. ‘If I’m being held hostage at gunpoint, I at least expect my rescuers to have the decency to run to my rescue.’

  ‘It’s boiling hot out there,’ James said.

  ‘I could have run,’ Bruce said, ‘but James was knackered after ten minutes.’

  James gave Bruce a fierce look. Teams were supposed to stick together, not drop one another in it at the first opportunity.

  ‘Can’t manage a little ten-kilometre run, eh, James?’ Mr Large said, breaking into an evil grin. ‘Looks like you’ve let yourself get out of shape holidaying out here in the sunshine.’

  ‘I’m fit,’ James said. ‘It’s just the heat.’

  ‘So, because you took so long to arrive, it was dark when you got to the villa, making it much more difficult to survey. Not that it matters, because you didn’t do a proper survey anyway.’

  ‘I had a good look through the fence,’ James said, defensively.

  Large banged his fist on the roof of the car.

  ‘That’s a survey, is it? What have you two been taught?’

  ‘Before entering hostile premises, always do a thorough survey, investigating the building from all sides,’ Bruce said mechanically. ‘If possible, climb a tree or go to higher ground and get a look at the layout of the building from above.’

  ‘If you remember what it says in the training manual, Bruce, why did you decide that a glance through the fence was sufficient?’

  Bruce and James both looked sheepish. Kerry and Gabrielle loved watching the boys squirm.

  ‘If you’d done a proper survey, maybe you would have seen the dog kennel. Maybe you could have planned a proper entry and exit strategy, instead of crawling up to the house and hoping for the best. Then, once you’d recovered the hostages, you decided to escape using the car. Didn’t it occur to you that the car was the most obvious way to escape and was almost certainly booby-trapped? Or were you blinded by the prospect of lighting up the tyres and taking it for a spin?’

  ‘It did occur that it was obvious,’ James said.

  ‘So why did you try to escape that way?’ Large screamed.

  ‘I mean … But … I only realised right before I got shot.’

  ‘This has got to be the worst performance on a training exercise I have ever seen,’ Mr Large shouted. ‘You two have ignored every piece of training you’ve been given. If this was a real operation, you would have been killed ten times over. You’re both getting grade F and James, I’m putting you on an emergency fitness plan. Ten kilometres running a day and, as you’re so worried about the heat, I’ll let you start when it’s nice and cool. How does five in the morning sound?’

  James knew better than to answer back, it only earned you push-ups. Mr Large stepped back and took deep breaths. His head looked like a redcurrant after all the shouting.

  ‘What grade did me and Gabrielle get?’ Kerry asked, using her crawliest voice.

  ‘B, I suppose,’ Mr Large said. ‘You did a bang-up job, but I can’t give you an A because you were up against such feeble opposition.’

  Gabrielle and Kerry smiled at each other. James wanted to knock their stupid smug heads together.

  ‘Right, time to head back to the hostel,’ Large said. ‘Bruce, I need the car key.’

  Bruce chucked it over.

  ‘That won’t work,’ Gabrielle said. ‘That’s for the front door of the villa. I put it on a Mercedes key ring so it looked like the car key. You want this one.’

  Mr Large caught the real car key and loaded Thatcher the dog on to the front seat. Gabrielle and Kerry got in the back, squashed up with the two eight-year-olds.

  ‘Oh no,’ Mr Large grinned, as his massive body sank into the driver’s seat. ‘Not enough room in the car. It looks like James and Bruce will have to find their own way home.’

  ‘But we drove in the van for ages before they dropped us off,’ James gasped. ‘I’ve got no idea how to get back to the hostel from here.’

  ‘How awfully sad,’ Mr Large said, sarcastically. ‘I tell you what, if you manage to make it home before midnight, I’ll put your grade up to a D and you won’t have to repeat the exercise.’

  Mr Large turned the key in the ignition and the car started rolling forward. Thatcher poked her head out of the window and barked as the car crunched down the gravel driveway. James and Bruce looked despondently at each other.

  ‘I don’t think it’s that hard,’ Bruce said. ‘It’s three hours until midnight and it’s all downhill.’

  James looked totally miserable. ‘My legs feel like blocks of wood.’

  ‘Well,’ Bruce said, ‘I’m gonna start walking. You can go through this again if you want, but I’m not going to.’

  ‘What I can’t believe,’ James said, ‘is that everyone told me to get my act together and I never listened.’

  3. SUN

  Unless they’re away on a mission, every kid at CHERUB spends five weeks in the summer on the Mediterranean island of C—. It’s mostly a holiday: a
chance to muck about on the beach, play sport, ride quad bikes over the sand dunes and have a shot at being normal kids. But cherubs aren’t normal kids: they could be sent on an undercover mission at any time. Even on holiday, they are expected to stay fit and do the odd training exercise.

  Like loads of cherubs before him, James found it easy to slack off when there was a beach on the doorstep and tons of other kids to muck around with. For the last four weeks, he’d skipped fitness training. He’d spent his days messing about on the beach and his nights watching DVD marathons while stuffing his face with popcorn and chocolate. When James got his training assignment, he ignored Kerry’s advice to study it thoroughly and went out on a jet ski instead.

  James considered his folly as he sauntered through the sticky night air towards the CHERUB hostel. The physical training instructors were going to make his life a misery. Once you gave them a reason, they didn’t let off until you were back in top shape. James couldn’t make any excuses: Amy, Kyle and loads of teachers had warned him to exercise and take the training seriously, but he’d lost all sense of responsibility the second he hit the beach.

  Even after getting lost a couple of times, James and Bruce beat the midnight deadline for getting back. James had a grazed elbow where he’d tripped in a pothole in the dark and they were both gasping for a drink.

  A bunch of older kids were having a moonlit barbecue in the gardens at the front of the hostel. Amy Collins came running over the lawn when she noticed James. She was beautiful, sixteen years old, with long blonde hair. She wore denim shorts and a flowery top that stopped above the gold ring through her navel.

  ‘Nice paint job, boys,’ she giggled. ‘Gabrielle and Kerry said they scrubbed the floor with the pair of you.’

  ‘You’re drunk,’ James said.

  Drinking alcohol wasn’t allowed, but CHERUB staff turned a blind eye with the older kids, as long as they didn’t go mad.

  ‘Just a teensy drop,’ Amy said. ‘We went out on a boat and caught fish.’

  Amy spread her arms out to the size of a big fish, almost lost her balance and doubled over in drunken hysterics.

  ‘You want barbecued fish?’ she spluttered. ‘And there’s fresh bread from the village.’

  ‘It’s late,’ James said, shaking his head. ‘We’d better clean up.’

  ‘We emptied the whole ocean,’ Amy giggled. ‘Anyway, I’m busting to pee. I’ll see you two scumbags in the morning.’

  As Amy staggered away, she thought of something and turned back.

  ‘Oh, James.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I told you so.’

  James gave her the finger and wandered towards the main entrance of the hostel with Bruce in tow. The less contact they had with other kids, the less they would get flamed for mucking up the training exercise. They ducked down as they passed the recreation room, where about thirty kids were watching a horror movie on a projector screen. A couple of little red-shirt kids snickered at their paint-spattered clothes as the boys walked upstairs to the second-floor bedroom they shared with Gabrielle and Kerry.

  The room was an L shape, with the girls’ beds at one end and the boys’ around the corner at the other. It was basic compared to their individual rooms back at campus: ceiling fans, tile floor, wicker chairs and a tiny TV. It hardly mattered because the kids were always busy and only used the rooms to wash and crash out.

  Kerry and Gabrielle had been back a couple of hours. The TV was showing an episode of The Simpsons in Spanish, which both girls could understand. They kept quiet, not even commenting on the stench of sweat.

  ‘Well?’ James said.

  Kerry gave an innocent smile. ‘Well, what?’

  ‘I know you’re gonna start on us,’ James said, sitting on his bed and pulling off his trainers. ‘So go on, get it over with. Rub our noses in it.’

  ‘We’d never do that,’ Gabrielle said. ‘We’re nice girls.’

  ‘My arse,’ Bruce said.

  Kerry sat up on her bed. She was pink and shrivelled, like she’d just finished a long bath. James dumped his filthy polo shirt on the floor.

  ‘You better take that stuff down to the laundry when you’ve had your showers,’ Kerry said. ‘It’ll stink the whole room out.’

  ‘If you don’t like my stink,’ Bruce said, kicking off his trainers, ‘you take it down there.’

  He balled up his crusty sock and lobbed it on to Kerry’s duvet. She flicked it away with the end of a biro.

  ‘So, how come it took you so long to get back here?’ Kerry asked, trying not to grin.

  As soon as she said that, Gabrielle started cracking up.

  ‘What are you laughing for?’ James asked. ‘It’s fourteen kilometres between here and the villa. I’d like to see you two do it any quicker.’

  ‘They’re so thick,’ Gabrielle howled. ‘I can’t believe it.’

  ‘What?’ James asked. ‘What’s thick?’

  ‘Didn’t you bother checking out the house?’ Kerry grinned.

  ‘We couldn’t hang around,’ Bruce explained. ‘We had to be back here by midnight.’

  ‘There was money all over the kitchen cabinet,’ Kerry said.

  ‘What good could that do us?’ Bruce asked.

  ‘And there was a working telephone,’ Kerry continued. ‘And a telephone directory.’

  James was getting impatient. ‘So what?’

  ‘This isn’t Outer Mongolia,’ Gabrielle said, making a telephone receiver out of her hand and putting it to her ear. ‘Why didn’t you pick up the phone and call a taxi?’

  ‘Eh?’ James gasped, turning around and giving Bruce a blank stare.

  ‘Taxi,’ Kerry snorted, hardly able to get the words out over her giggles. ‘T – A – X – I, they’re like a normal car, with a man to drive you and a little orange lamp on the roof.’

  ‘Oh…’ James said bitterly, looking at Bruce. ‘Why didn’t we get a cab?’

  ‘Don’t have a go at me,’ Bruce said. ‘You never thought of it either.’

  Gabrielle was rolled up in a ball, laughing so hard the frame of her bed was shaking.

  ‘You two dickheads walked fourteen kilometres when you could have called a taxi and been home in an hour,’ Kerry said, pedalling her feet in the air with delight.

  James’ socks were bloody where they’d chafed on the long walk. His back and shoulders hurt from carrying the pack, his elbow was agony and his leg still stank of dog mess, even though he’d washed it. One day, he would be able to laugh about this, but right now he was ready to explode.

  ‘This is bull,’ James screamed, hurling his trainers against the wall.

  He kicked out at his wardrobe, but he was tired and lost his balance. He ended up in a heap on the floor, making the girls laugh even harder. Bruce looked just as mad, but he concentrated his energy into ripping off his clothes and heading towards the shower.

  ‘Give us two minutes before you go in there,’ Kerry said, wiping tears of joy from her eyes. ‘I want to go to bed in a minute. Can I quickly brush my teeth?’

  Bruce tutted. ‘Go on then, but don’t take all night.’

  Kerry padded barefoot into the bathroom and squeezed out a ball of toothpaste. Bruce and James waited by the open doorway in their boxers while she brushed. Kerry tried to control her laughing, but she couldn’t resist having another dig.

  ‘Fourteen kilometres,’ she shrieked, spluttering white toothpaste foam all over the bathroom mirror.

  Bruce couldn’t take any more abuse.

  ‘Let’s see how you like being laughed at,’ he shouted.

  As Kerry bent over the tap to rinse her mouth, Bruce dunked her head. He only meant to nudge her so she got water over her face, but he did it too hard. Kerry’s front tooth hit the tap and she sprung up furiously.

  ‘You idiot,’ Kerry stormed, nervously feeling inside her mouth. ‘I think you’ve chipped my tooth.’

  Bruce realised he’d overdone it, but he wasn’t about to go apologising to someone w
ho’d spent the last ten minutes taking the mickey out of him.

  ‘Good,’ he snapped. ‘Serves you right.’

  Kerry grabbed a glass off the sink and threw it at Bruce’s head. He ducked and the glass shattered against the wall.

  ‘Cool it,’ James said. ‘This isn’t worth fighting over.’

  ‘Do you think I’m gonna grow a new tooth?’ Kerry screamed.

  She stepped forward and gave Bruce an almighty shove. Bruce adopted a fighting stance.

  ‘You want a piece of me?’ he shouted.

  Kerry looked ferocious as she wiped her lips on to the sleeve of her nightshirt.

  ‘If you want to get your arse kicked by a girl for the second time today,’ she snarled, ‘that’s fine by me.’

  James wedged himself between Kerry and Bruce. He was taller and stockier than the two kids he was trying to keep apart.

  ‘Get out the way, James,’ Bruce said.

  ‘I’m going for Bruce whether you like it or not,’ Kerry said, drilling James with her eyes. ‘If you’re in my way, you’ll get damaged.’

  James could beat either Kerry or Bruce for strength, say in an arm-wrestle, but fighting was more about skill. Kerry and Bruce had done combat training at CHERUB for five years, whereas James had come to CHERUB less than a year earlier. He’d be out of his depth in a stand-up fight against either of them.

  ‘You’re not fighting,’ James said unconvincingly, hoping Kerry was bluffing. ‘I’m staying right here.’

  Kerry stepped forward, swept James’ ankle away and jammed two fingers into his ribs. It was an elementary technique for knocking someone over without seriously hurting them. James crawled towards his bed as violence exploded over his head.

  Kerry was off balance after knocking James out of the way. Bruce used this to his advantage, putting Kerry out of action with one blow. Kerry staggered forward, gasping for breath as the end music for The Simpsons came on the TV.

  Bruce thought the fight was as good as won. He moved to put Kerry in a headlock, but she’d played Bruce for a sucker. She quickly regained her balance, spun out of the way, hooked a foot around Bruce’s ankles and swept his legs away.