New Guard (CHERUB) (17 page)

Kerry snorted. ‘You left early to play golf two afternoons this week. I’ve been here until eight every night, trying to sort this leasing deal.’

Doug stood up and roared. ‘How dare you speak to me like that in my own office. You’ve worked here less than two years. I’ve had unpaid interns who are more effective than you.’

‘You’re a bully,’ Kerry told her boss, as he moved around the table and faced her off.

‘Sweetheart, if you can’t take the heat …’

‘Do you want me to try and find someone from another law firm, or not?’ Kerry asked. ‘And I am
not
your sweetheart.’

‘Whatever,’ Doug said. ‘You made the problem,
you
solve it.’

Kerry made a little grunt as she spun on high heels and left her boss’ office.

‘You OK?’ a colleague asked, seeing a tear in Kerry’s eye as she strode twenty paces to her windowless office.

‘I’ll live,’ Kerry said unconvincingly.

But the tears kept welling when Kerry reached her desk. Besides the contract her boss was yelling about, there were files for three more deals on her desk: finance for a soft drink bottling plant in Chile, a deal to lease trains in Russia and a Spanish billionaire who was planning to buy a Welsh furniture maker, fire all the workers and move production to a giant factory he was building in Romania.

If nothing happened, she’d get through all of her work by 7 p.m., but something always happened. Kerry groaned as her mobile buzzed, but smiled when she saw a picture message from James on the screen. It showed the peeling frontage of accommodation hut 32 at the CHERUB summer hostel.

Just landed. Remember what we got up to in here, back in Summer 08?

Kerry zoomed the picture message as Doug walked by, bawling out someone else. She could see a tiny James, reflected in the hut’s front window, with his camera phone in front of his face and the black skinny jeans that made his bum look good. She’d never wanted to hug him so badly and her fingers hovered over the keyboard on her screen, before typing:

2 late 2 join the gang?

James was online and replied instantly.
Heck no!!! RU serious?

Deadly serious.

Kerry trembled as she opened her briefcase. She tipped all the work papers on to her desk, took out her work phone and laptop. Then she replaced them with a framed desk photo of James and the bobble head Elvis and Jesus figures stuck to the top of her monitor.

She spent a couple of minutes stripping a few compromising pages from the file on the furniture factory takeover. She dropped them into an envelope, did a quick Google search and addressed it to the editor of a local newspaper based close to the Welsh furniture factory. It wouldn’t stop the takeover, but at least the bank and the billionaire wouldn’t be able to lie about the takeover benefiting the workers and local community.

Kerry stripped the ID badge from around her neck and hooked it over the monitor before stepping into the hallway. There was a photocopier at the end and Doug was there, looming over a curly-haired graduate yelling,
I need those figures by yesterday!

Part of Kerry wanted to take a short run, sweep her boss’ legs and flatten his nose. Part of her wanted to say goodbye to some co-workers she considered friends. But mostly, she just wanted to be out of here.

She handed the envelope to a receptionist. ‘That needs to be sent by urgent courier,’ Kerry explained. ‘Tell Doug I’ve found an outside lawyer and I’m heading there now to sort the Kobyashi contract.’

Kerry’s brain churned as the lift took her down. Thinking about the salary she’d given up and six-figure bonus due in January. Was it crazy to quit a sought-after job for some high-risk mission halfway around the world?

The weird thing was, she’d never felt more sure of anything in her life.

‘G’day,’ Capstick shouted, in his annoying Aussie drawl. ‘I’ve got good news.’

The squat instructor stood by the summer hostel swimming pool. Ning, Ryan, Leon, Daniel and Alfie faced him in their CHERUB uniform, while two assistant instructors stood at a console nearby, working out how to retract the electric pool cover.

‘Normally, my job is to persecute you kids and get you into the best shape possible,’ Capstick continued. ‘But this is a different situation. I have twenty-eight days to prepare former CHERUB agents for a highly dangerous mission. They left CHERUB more than five years ago, and most of them now spend their days sat on fat lazy asses behind a desk. Your job is to motivate the grown-ups by showing them how far they’ve fallen off the pace. You’re gonna go on training runs with them. You’ll spar with them, play sport with them and study with them. It’s old CHERUB versus new and I want you to show no mercy.’

‘Current versus Crusty,’ Ryan suggested.

Capstick wagged a finger and laughed. ‘I like those names. So go get your swimmers on, ’cos we’re gonna start with some fun in the pool.’

‘Look at that,’ Bruce teased, poking the ripple of flab over the waistband of Kyle’s swim shorts. ‘And when did that skin last catch some sun?’

‘Screw you,’ Kyle said, as the pair followed James down a curved path running between the accommodation huts and the main pool. ‘Just because I haven’t spent the last year bumming around on some beach in Thailand.’

‘Bumming around!’ Bruce snorted. ‘Six hours’ training four days a week, plus I was teaching Muay Thai classes.’

Lauren was waiting for them. Sat on a low wall, in pool shoes and a Lycra one-piece. She had a decent tan for someone with a pale complexion. Her shoulders and arms were ripped, because motor sport puts massive strain on the neck.

‘I see a dividing line,’ Bruce told Lauren, as she stood up. ‘Those who respect their bodies, and those who gave up.’

Lauren smirked when she saw Kyle. ‘You’re
actually
chubbier than James.’

‘Hey!’ James yelled. ‘Mission controllers have to train. I’m not
that
unfit.’

‘I hate all of you,’ Kyle noted, as they rounded a line of trees and reached the edge of the pool.

‘Aww crap,’ James said, as soon as he saw what was about to happen. ‘I
hate
this game.’

The Olympic-size pool had been set up with a hundred coloured balls floating on the surface. A dumpster at either end would serve as a goal.

‘You’re two minutes late,’ Capstick said, glancing at his huge plastic diver’s watch. ‘Do that again and I’ll give you push-ups. Red balls are worth one point, yellow three, blue five and green ten. You’re only allowed to carry one ball at a time. Barging is allowed, but no holding, no hitting and instant disqualification if you hold anyone’s head under the water. Each round lasts twenty minutes, or until all the balls are cleared. The first team to win three rounds wins the match. The losing team has to run the twelve-kilometre circuit of the island before they get dinner.’

‘There’s five of them and four of us,’ Lauren pointed out. ‘That’s not fair.’

Capstick scoffed. ‘Blame your brother for his slack recruiting skills. Fair is for fairy tales. Now get to your end of the pool.’

The four Crustys and five Currents lined up, fifty metres apart at opposite ends of the pool. A training assistant with his legs dangling over the end of a high board blew a whistle and everyone dived in.

Although wind and currents had blown the balls around, most were clumped in the middle of the pool, close to where they’d been released. Everyone wanted the ten-point green balls first. Bruce and Ning were the fastest swimmers on their teams and each scooped a green.

Alfie tried using his bulk to stop Bruce, but Lauren was close behind. Bruce flipped the ball across, giving her a simple shot into the mouth of the blue dumpster.

‘Ten nil,’ Bruce shouted, as he quickly grabbed a three-point yellow and flung it at Lauren as Alfie locked arms around his waist.

‘Holding!’ Bruce protested.

Alfie was twenty centimetres taller than Bruce and fifteen kilos heavier. But Bruce was super strong. He ripped free, then drove Alfie hard into the poolside, leaving him badly winded. With Alfie temporarily disabled, Bruce and Lauren linked up, with Bruce throwing balls across and Lauren making the short final throw into the goal.

But while Team Crusty’s healthy duo racked up the points, things were going less well at the other end. With a man over, Ryan and Leon played a tactical game, lobbing dozens of balls down towards their goal, allowing Daniel and Ning to scoop and shoot.

Kyle threw balls back and batted Daniel’s throws with some success, but Ning was a fish and James couldn’t get within two metres as she rattled a stream of plastic balls into the dumpster. Rather than a losing battle with Ning, James decided to break along the edge of the pool. He scooped several balls and flipped them up to Bruce as he swam. But as he neared the middle, James found himself double-teamed by Ryan and Alfie.

As Alfie gave James a powerful shove, Ryan dived and whipped down his shorts.

‘Hey!’ James shouted, grabbing frantically as Ryan surfaced and resumed lobbing balls down towards Daniel and Ning.

Five minutes into the twenty, more than half the balls had been cleared. Those that remained tended to be low-value reds and yellows, scattered along the edges of the pool. Bruce and Ning were sharks amidst dolphins, scoring consistently with the opposition getting nowhere near. At the other extreme, Kyle was red-faced as he clambered out of the pool and lay flat on his back, breathing rapidly.

‘Are you hurt?’ James shouted, looking around after hitting the dumpster rim with the last five-point blue.

‘Stitch,’ Kyle gasped. ‘So painful.’

‘It’s the first round,’ James said. ‘And I thought
I
was unfit.’

With Kyle out it was five against three. The Currents made their numbers count, with their two fastest swimmers – Ning and Ryan – collecting balls and feeding them to Alfie’s long arms near the goal, while the twins did what they could to harass the opposition.

There were four and a half minutes on the countdown when the last single-point reds clattered into the dumpsters at either end. Kyle had made it to a sunlounger and was still clutching his side as the others climbed out of the pool and the training assistants tipped up the dumpsters and started tallying points.

‘You’re bright red,’ Lauren noted, as she gave Kyle a look of concern.

‘Heart attack material,’ Bruce teased. ‘I thought you belonged to a gym.’

‘Didn’t say he actually went though,’ James noted.

‘Just gimme a couple of days,’ Kyle moaned. ‘I’ll be fine once I’ve blasted off the cobwebs.’

‘We have a winner,’ Capstick announced, as one of the assistants handed him a piece of paper. ‘Current Agents, two hundred and forty-three. Crusty Old Agents, one hundred and thirty-two.’

‘Hah!’ Leon shouted, as he high-fived Ning. ‘That’s almost two to one.’

Lauren and Bruce looked at each other, shaking heads as Capstick approached, smiling and thumping James on the back.

‘How’s my training so far, boss?’ he asked.

Since James was in charge of the mission, he was technically Capstick’s boss. Though he’d have to follow orders during physical training, if he didn’t want to lose everyone’s respect.

‘I’m grand,’ James lied. ‘Fine and dandy.’

‘Looking forward to that run around the island?’ Capstick asked, as he eyed Kyle. ‘My youngsters have you whipped, and you might end up having to give this fellow a piggyback.’

As the training assistants poured balls back into the pool ready for round two, James saw Tovah coming down the path from the huts, dressed in a black bikini.

‘I could bury my face in that cleavage,’ Bruce noted quietly.

‘Misogynist pig,’ Lauren growled, as she thumped him.

‘Hey,’ Tovah said, peering at James over the top of her sunglasses. ‘This looks like fun. Can anyone play?’

The hut slept eight, so James, Kyle and Bruce got a set of bunks each.

‘Oh, glorious day!’ Bruce said brightly, as he came from a slightly grungy bathroom dressed in shorts. ‘Sun is shining and life is good!’

‘Sod off,’ Kyle moaned, pulling a pillow over his face. ‘My body hurts.’

‘What bit?’

‘All of it,’ Kyle said, as he sat up. ‘I’m old.’

‘You’re twenty-six,’ Bruce noted. ‘Jesus.’

Kyle saw a tangle of sheets in the next bunk across. ‘Is James up?’

Bruce smiled. ‘Kerry arrived on a boat around three a.m. They were all over each other.’

‘I wish I had that,’ Kyle said.

‘What?’ Bruce asked.

‘James and Kerry,’ Kyle explained. ‘They’re like an institution. None of that messing around trying to find my perfect guy. You just meet someone when you’re twelve and it all goes great.’

Bruce laughed. ‘They’ve broken up a hundred times.’

Kyle nodded as he pulled up a set of tracksuit bottoms. ‘But did we ever doubt that they’d get back together every time it happened?’

‘I dated Kerry,’ Bruce pointed out acidly.

‘No offence,’ Kyle said, clutching his ribs and groaning as he stood up.

‘So over it,’ Bruce said. ‘Thai girls are awesome! How’s your love life these days? You still seeing that quantity surveyor with the nose ring?’

‘He dumped me for an Indian PHP programmer,’ Kyle said, sighing as he checked his iPhone and slid feet into Adidas. ‘Breakfast?’

‘Bloody right,’ Bruce said. ‘I’ve got a crazy appetite.’

The main kitchen and dining-room was undergoing an off-season refurbishment, so the chef had made do with a domestic kitchen in a staff flat. She’d cleared sofas out of a living-room and found odd chairs and fold-out tables to make a dining space.

‘Ahoy, mateys,’ James crowed, as Kyle and Bruce joined him at a buffet table.

‘Look at that grin,’ Bruce teased, as James loaded his plate with bacon, eggs and sausage. ‘Someone got lucky last night.’

‘Where is Kerry?’ Kyle asked.

‘Shower,’ James explained.

Lauren was eating with Capstick at one table, while a rowdy crowd of current agents sat at the next.

‘Why you holding your back, Kyle?’ Alfie shouted. ‘Need a walking stick? Or maybe a Zimmer frame?’

Bruce narrowed his eyes. ‘How’s them ribs I smashed into the poolside, Alfie? Nice and bruised, like Daniel’s eye?’