The two special forces troopers leapt into the back of the vehicle.
‘Appreciate it,’ one of the special forces guys said and started covering out the back of the TSV.
‘I think your friends have had it,’ the other one said. Psycho looked behind him. The top of Walowski’s head was missing. He couldn’t see the wound that had killed Geordie, he just saw the man’s dead eyes staring up at the night sky. Perkins was still screaming at him. One of the special forces guys put their hand on his shoulder.
‘Mate, trust me on this, you need to start driving, okay?’
Psycho nodded and started heading for the FOB. He could see the unmistakable silhouette of the derelict power station ahead of him as he watched the light from the missile’s engines rise into the sky beyond the FOB.
‘Look, we say nothing about it kicking off, okay,’ Perkins said. Nobody answered.
Yeah right, Psycho thought, who would have thought Mrs Sykes’ little boy was going to turn grass?
The ground shook and the horizon behind them turned to fire. Psycho glanced behind. It was only then he realised how beautiful it all was. It was only then he realised how much he’d enjoyed the firefight.
He can hear a voice.
‘I’m not sure how much more the subject can take of this, physiologically speaking,’
None, I can’t take any more, please, you have to kill me, he thinks. He wants to scream this at them but he can’t.
Another voice now: ‘This is not what we intended. We’re not sadists.’
‘I’m not sure that this poor bastard would know it.’
Dragged out of the back of the wagon. He hit the floor and was given a bit of a kicking. Psycho curled up into a ball. He’d had worse, frankly. He was hungry, he’d had little to eat over the last week, but it was how tired he was that got to him. Not just lack of sleep, not the solid mass of aches that was his body, it was the physical and mental fatigue that made him feel that he was just stumbling through a half-world.
‘Get up, maggot!’ More kicking.
The Special Forces Support Group had been the hunters on the week-long escape and evasion exercise. Psycho and the other hopefuls who had made it this far had been given a World War 2 era greatcoat and a tin with some bits of survival kit in it. Basically he’d been living rough for the better part of the week. He’d made it as far as Bristol and had hid out amongst the homeless camps there. He had thought about trying to jump a train and heading back to London, but decided against it.
He had turned himself in at the end of week for the final part of Special Forces selection: RTI, or resistance to interrogation training. This would also be conducted by the SFSG, many of whom were Royal Marines, RAF Regiment and Paras, Psycho’s regiment, all performing under the watchful eye of instructors from the SAS, SBS and Special Reconnaissance Regiment.
‘Get up, you piece of filth!’ And the boots came in again.
Sorry mate, as cold and wet as the ground is, I like it down here, even with you kicking me, Psycho thought. He was pretty sure that even with them kicking him he could go to sleep on the ground. You want me up, you’re going to have to…
He felt himself being dragged to his feet. His legs threatened to buckle.
‘What unit are you with?! Where are the rest of your men?’ someone who’d been eating curry recently screamed in his face. He wanted to give them his name, rank and number, he really did, he tried but it came out a slurred mess. The punch to the stomach doubled him over. Made him retch up his last meal.
‘Disgusting!’
Psycho tried to collapse but arms grabbed him and pulled him to his feet before dragging him towards a set of Quonset huts.
It seemed pointless to Psycho. He was so tired he wanted to cry, but it didn’t make him want to talk. He was so tired he didn’t think he could talk. He just nodded off when he could and was woken up by shouting or by collapsing to the ground.
All the shouting felt like it was coming to him through cotton wool. He didn’t really understand what most of it was about. They had him standing in stress positions, but he kept on falling out of them as he faded towards sleep. It was cold because they had stripped him, but even that didn’t stop him from falling asleep on his feet. They’d had a female soldier come in and make fun of his genitalia. That had just seemed weird. So weird, in fact, that it had set him off with hysterical giggling that had earned him a bit of a kicking.
He’d managed to give them his name and rank a few times but he could not remember his number. It wasn’t that he was tougher than any of the other recruits that had made it this far in the selection. It was just that his brain handled this sort of thing by drifting off. Tired as he was, it all seemed to be happening so far away. The only times that he was brought back into reality was when they hit him. On the other hand, he’d taken lots of beating in the past.
They were trying to get him to stand up but he was a dead weight. His lack of co-operation was getting him another beating. He managed to stand up, leaning forwards against the wall in a stress position. He collapsed and blacked out as he slid his face down the wall.
That fucking hurt! He was wide-awake now. He threw up down himself. Something very hard had hit him in the kidneys. Bitter experience told him he’d be pissing blood for the next week.
‘Sarge?’ The voice sounded unsure.
‘Shut up.’ Psycho recognised the voice but he couldn’t place it. It sounded like it was coming from far away, through a thick fog. ‘We’re supposed to break them, aren’t we?’
Psycho screamed. Something had hit his right hand and he’d felt the bones break inside.
‘I think he felt that,’ Perkins said. ‘Ironic, taking out the biggest wanker I’ve ever met’s wanking hand.’
Even through the pain it was so difficult to open his eyes. He recognised Perkins’ voice, though. He felt something cold run through his body. He wanted to fight, but even had he been able to move, and he didn’t think he was, he was cable-tied to a chair.
‘H-how…?’ Psycho tried to ask. Perkins grabbed him by the hair and bent Psycho’s head back. How did you get into the SFSG? Psycho wanted to ask. He had reported Perkins for what had happened in the LCZ but the army didn’t want to do anything about it. It got lost in the furore of the HMS Anguish’s missile attack. It had been made clear, however, that Perkins was finished in the paras one way or another. Now it seemed that he had been promoted to sergeant and had made it into the SFSG.
‘You always knew how to play the game,’ Psycho tried to say. Instead he mostly mumbled and drooled on himself.
‘What’s that?’ Perkins asked and then swung the collapsible baton into Psycho’s balls. Psycho howled and then passed out.
‘See, this little prick can’t be allowed into the SAS. Know what he did? Know what he fucking did!? Only killed an unarmed kid in the LCZ, dropped us right in it and then shat himself when they returned fire. He’s a fucking coward and a liability!’
Not true, some part of Psycho was screaming. He felt sick. His hand and his balls were agony. His hair was grabbed again.
‘Tell them! Tell them what you fucking did!’ Perkins was screaming at him, spraying him with saliva.
‘N… n… no,’ Psycho managed. Perkins started hitting Psycho’s arm as hard as he could, over and over again. Psycho was screaming with every blow.
‘Tell them what you did! Tell them and I’ll stop!’