Hector turned to him. Max remembered what Hector had said on his first day here. If you don’t throw your hat in by the end of day four, I’ll eat mine. Well, Max hadn’t thrown his hat in. He felt proud of that.

Hector looked him up and down. ‘What happened today?’ he said.

‘I tripped,’ Max said. He was on the verge of mentioning the paracord and the chewing-gum wrapper. But he kept that to himself. ‘I think I twisted my ankle.’

‘If you trip and twist your ankle on operations, you don’t just compromise yourself, you compromise everyone on your team.’ Hector’s stare seemed to drill into Max.

‘I understand,’ Max said in a level voice. ‘It won’t happen again.’

‘You’re right there. It won’t happen again. Your time was too slow today. You’re not up to the level we require in the Special Forces Cadets. You need to forget all about what you’ve seen here. You’re going home too.’

Max blinked at him. ‘But … you said you needed five of us.’

‘We need five cadets up to the correct standard. If we can’t find them, we make do with fewer. There’s no way we can keep you on the team. You’d just bring everyone else down with you.’

‘But –’

‘No buts. A helicopter will arrive at 10:30 tomorrow morning to take you and Ash back home. I’m sorry.’

Max stared dumbly at him. He couldn’t think of anything to say.

‘The rest of you, don’t imagine this is the end. It’s just the beginning. There will be a badging ceremony at 11:00 to officially confirm you as Special Forces Cadets. Then the work really begins. Continuation training starts as soon as these two have left. Get a good night’s sleep. You’re going to need it.’

Hector turned his back on them and marched towards the house. Woody and Angel exchanged a glance. They looked stunned. But they were evidently in no position to say anything. ‘Come on, you lot,’ Woody said quietly. ‘Let’s get you back to your huts.’

The others followed them across the parade ground. Max stood, motionless, watching them go.

And as he watched, he wondered. What had he expected? That he was going to be lifted from his ordinary, friendless, family-free life and parachuted into something more exciting and meaningful?

Of course not. Stuff like that didn’t happen to people like him. He felt stupid for even believing that might happen.

He was going home.

He had failed.

10

Green Thunder

It had been a long evening, and was turning into an even longer night.

Sami had been kind. As Max returned to the Nissen hut, his friend had come up to him and put one hand on his shoulder. ‘Maybe they’ll let you apply again,’ he said.

‘Yeah,’ Max replied. ‘Maybe.’ He knew they wouldn’t. He knew he’d blown it.