Chapter Text
Kira felt like she was going to die. It was hot. Her drill sergeants were yelling at her. This gear weighed 8,000 kilos. She’d been running for what seemed like hours. If she didn’t die immediately, she prayed for it. Surely death was easier than this. Trying for the SAS had been a mistake, she thought to herself as she ran another kilometer, another dusty, hot kilometer.
She’d made it through basic but this was something else. She’d cockily joked about basic being the test for SAS recruitment one time, in a bar, three years ago, when she was drunk. She was eating her words today. This, whatever this was, was not nearly on par with the mediocrity that was basic training. As she ran, she wondered if anyone had ever actually died while doing this. Surely there’d been at least one. There was no way in Hell there wasn’t at least one. She was sure she’d be number two. “Endurance” was what this particular drill was called, the final test for entry into the SAS.
“Everette, you’re fucking slow. My Nan can run faster than you with a broken hip, Everette! Did your father ever tell you that you were a disappointment? Because you are, Everette!” Her drill sergeant yelled at her as she sprinted, in full gear, pack on her back, up and down the mountains at Brecon Beacons in Wales.
“Yes Sergeant!” She yelled back, peeling her tongue from the roof of her mouth. Her thighs were on fire. Her chest heaved as she ran, keeping with the middle-front of her squad. She hoped, desperately, that she wasn’t the only one contemplating her life choices in that moment, because she’d had the opportunity to go into Admin and had chosen the special forces instead.
Her drill sergeant moved to the back of the pack, yelling obscenities and oddly specific insults at those behind her. She wished it meant she could have breathed easier, but no. Her lungs still felt like they were going to collapse. How much running do the SAS do? She wondered as she continued her steady pace. But she saw it then, the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. The finish line. She sped up, passing several of her colleagues, determined to finish as close as possible to the front of the pack. When she crossed the line, she bent over and vomited. She wasn’t even ashamed as she puked her guts up. She wasn’t alone. Literally fuck this shit, she groaned inwardly as her mouth filled with saliva. Saliva she could have used three kilometers ago when she was fighting for her life.
Her hands rested on her knees as she wretched. Her chest heaved and she could have kissed the ground of the Safe Zone. There was someone in BDUs handing out water bottles and comforting words, and Kira wanted to punch them. How dare they be this nice and attentive after they’d watched her fight for her life.
After a long while, Kira stood straight; chugging her water. She knew it was a bad move. She’d probably end up vomiting again, and soon, at the rate she was consuming liquids. She’d done it. She’d made it through Endurance. Women had only recently been allowed to try for entry into the SAS and she knew she should be proud, but all she could think about was how she was pretty sure her lungs were bleeding. She felt someone clap her on the back and she looked over to see her closest friend, Finn, standing next to her, his chest heaving.
“That was gross, mate.” He laughed out and she punched him on the arm.
“Get fucked, Finn.” She gasped out, opening her second bottle of water. “I can’t wait until this shit is over.” They started walking together back to their barracks. She was going to take the coldest shower possible. Neither she or Finn spoke as they walked, but they didn’t have to. Their silences were always comfortable.
They separated once inside, Finn to the male quarters and Kira to the female. She stripped down the second she made it to her room, tossing her stuff down wherever. She’d worry about it later. Wearing nothing but her towel, she padded to the shower room, shower caddy in hand. Since women were such a new addition to the SAS, she was one of only a handful, and so far, the only one who’d made it back to the barracks. That didn’t bode well for them and Kira felt uneasy.
She stood under the cold spray and moaned as the water hit her overheated skin. She felt shaky and decided to sit, giving her overworked legs a break. God, I’ll probably get some kind of skin disease from sitting on this gross ass floor, she thought to herself but couldn’t bring herself to care. After a while she stood and washed her hair, her body, massaging her most sore spots. Her shoulders ached from her heavy pack and she let out an undignified squeak as she pressed into the knots there. With a long sigh, she turned off the water and toweled off before returning to her room and dressing. She threw on military-issued shorts and T-shirt, her PT clothes, and then headed to the canteen to get some food.
The canteen was oddly quiet and sparsely littered with those that had already returned. They all met each other’s eyes and then knowingly glanced around at the empty tables where, only two days ago, their comrades had filled every seat. Endurance was known for knocking people out of the running. Kira couldn’t understand why she’d expected anything different. They’d started with two hundred candidates. As of that moment, only about forty were in line for food.
Once she had her tray, she took a seat at an empty table. It wasn’t long before Finn sat next to her on one side, and their friend Tom her other. None of them spoke as they dug into their food, but their obvious tension could have been cut with a knife. Finally, Tom set his fork down and looked around.
“Surely this isn’t all of us.” He said softly, and Kira looked around again. She didn’t see her friend Sarah, one of the only other female soldiers who’d been selected for consideration.
“Probably not. The ones that took a bit longer are probably in the showers now. I bet a few had to go to medical. There’ll be more of us.” She was trying to reassure all of them at once, herself included.
After a while, several more of their comrades trickled into the canteen and they began to breathe a little easier, but Kira still didn’t see Sarah. As she glanced around, she realized she didn’t see any of the other women who’d started either. She kept repeating what she’d said to the men to herself, sure that they’d appear any minute. By the time she finished her meal, they hadn’t. She stood and said goodbye to Tom and Finn before depositing her tray near the trash and heading to the women’s quarters. It was silent. She knocked on Sarah’s door and got no answer, and then did the same on the other candidates’ doors. She got no answers at any of them.
Increasingly disheartened, she made her way back to her room and flopped down on her bed. For a long time, all she did was stare at the ceiling but it wasn’t long that Endurance caught up with her and she was fast asleep. She didn’t move an inch for the rest of the night.
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The remaining candidates stood at ease in the largest conference room on base, milling about while waiting for their superiors to come make an announcement. Kira stood with Finn at the back of the room. It had been nearly a week since Endurance had ended, and much to Kira’s dismay, she was the only woman left. Sarah had stopped by her room, bags packed, before being shipped back to her old regiment. Kira had been incredibly upset, but Sarah had laughed dismissively.
“I’ll gladly go back to regular PT. But it’s just you now, Ki, make us proud.” She’d given her a brief hug and a wink and then was gone. Kira wasn’t much of a crier, but she did cry then, quietly. Everyone jumped to attention when the Lieutenant Commander walked into the room. They held that position until he’d made it to the head of the large conference table and called out a lazy “at ease”. While they relaxed some, they were all still noticeably tense.
“Look around the room.” He said quietly, and they did as they were bid, meeting each other’s eyes. “This is all that’s made it through the Aptitude phase. We started with two hundred candidates, and now we have forty-six. When we started this recruitment process, you were all told that usually about thirty or less make it all the way through recruitment. That means that, historically, by the end of the next two phases, sixteen more of you will have quit or failed.” Kira shifted, uncomfortable.
“That being said, I’m here to announce where we will be doing our Jungle phase. We’ll be working on land nav, patrol, and jungle survival skills.” He paused, glancing around the room, making eye contact with as many of them as he could see. “We are headed to Belize. We will be working specifically in the Columbia Forest Reserve. There will be many challenges, but not all of them just in skills training. Belize is hot. There are eight species of venomous snakes that live in that jungle. There are bullet ants, black widows, and brown recluse spiders. There are pumas, panthers, and Dart Frogs.” There were noticeably murmurs throughout the gathered soldiers. But the lieutenant commander wasn’t finished.
“But some of the most concerning dangers aren’t ones you will be able to see. There are plenty of parasites that love to make their homes in unsuspecting British bodies.” Kira felt a chill run down her back at the thought. At least she could shoot a puma. “You are all citizens of the United Kingdom. Unlike a good bit of the world, you all have been lucky in that there isn’t much here that is designed specifically to kill you. It’s going to be quite a shock.” Finn reached out discreetly and squeezed Kira’s hand. He hated spiders, or really anything creepy crawly, and this sounded like his worst nightmare. She gave a reassuring squeeze back, eyes fixed on the Commander.
“We are wheels up in two days. Friday morning at 0400, I expect all of you on the airfield.” He gave them all a hard look. “Forty-six. That’s it. Let’s see how many we have when this is complete. Dismissed.”