"Go!" Sergeant Kane barked, his thumb snapping down on the metal button.
I exploded off the starting line, the frozen dirt kicking up beneath my spotless boots.
My mind instantly calculated the distance to the eight-foot wall.
Standard recruits would jump, grab the top ledge, and haul themselves up with raw upper-body strength.
I hit the wooden planks with my right foot, using the forward momentum to launch myself vertical.
My hands barely grazed the top edge before I swung my legs over in one fluid, silent motion.
I landed in a crouch on the other side and immediately transitioned into a sprint.
Behind me, the loud jeers from the fence line abruptly cut off.
Next was the thirty-foot rope climb.
I didn’t pause to chalk my hands or reset my feet.
I leaped high, caught the thick hemp, and locked my boots into an S-wrap.
Remembering my cover, I forced myself to slow down slightly, mimicking the straining pulls of a standard officer.
Even holding back, I reached the top crossbeam in under eight seconds.
I tapped the iron bell, dropped ten feet before catching myself to absorb the shock, and hit the ground running.
"Check her transitions," I heard Corporal Rivera mutter as I passed the side marker.
"Nobody from a desk job moves like that," Corporal Brooks replied, the humor completely gone from his voice.
I dove headfirst into the freezing mud pit beneath the low-strung barbed wire.
The icy water shocked my skin, soaking through my pristine uniform in half a second.
Mud caked my elbows and knees as I low-crawled forward.
Instinct told me to roll onto my back and use my heels to propel myself under the wire—a classic Coronado technique.
Instead, I kept my face down, swimming through the thick sludge using rapid, brutal army crawls.
A jagged barb caught the back of my collar, tearing the fabric.
I didn’t stop to untangle it; I simply ripped forward and emerged from the pit covered in dark gray filth.
My lungs burned from the freezing air, but my heart rate remained steady and controlled.
I attacked the climbing bars next, my muddy hands slipping slightly on the cold steel.
Compensating with grip strength honed from nocturnal boarding operations, I swung from bar to bar without breaking rhythm.
By the time I reached the ten-foot wall, the entire Marine squad had moved from the fence to follow my progress.
Kane was jogging parallel to the course boundary, his eyes glued to my footwork.
The ten-foot wall was meant to break a runner’s spirit right as fatigue set in.
I sprinted straight at it, planted two steps up the vertical face, and caught the lip with my fingertips.
Pulling my chin over the edge, I hooked my heel and vaulted down the ten-foot drop on the reverse side.
I rolled through the landing to save my knees, coming up right at the base of the high balance beam.
One wrong step with mud-slicked boots meant a twelve-foot fall onto hard-packed gravel.
I didn’t slow down to balance my arms.
I ran across the narrow timber at full speed, trusting my center of gravity completely.
Leaping off the final platform, I dug my heels into the dirt and tore toward the finish line.
I crossed the white chalk mark in a dead sprint, decelerating smoothly over ten yards before turning around.
The training area was dead silent.
A dozen Marines stared at me, their breath fogging in the cold morning air.
Sergeant Kane walked slowly toward me, looking down at the silver stopwatch in his palm.
I stood at ease, mud dripping from my chin and uniform, breathing quietly through my nose.
"What’s the damage, Sergeant?" Corporal Grant called out from the back, breaking the silence.
Kane didn’t answer him.
He stopped two feet in front of me, his scarred eyebrow raised as he looked from the watch to my face.
"Four minutes, twelve seconds," Kane said quietly, though his voice carried in the stillness.
A collective murmur rippled through the watching squad.
I had beaten his legendary record by twenty-five seconds, and I was barely winded.
Kane stepped closer, lowering his voice so only I could hear.
"You held back on the rope and the mud crawl," he murmured, his sharp eyes locking onto mine.
"I don’t know what you mean, Sergeant," I replied evenly.
He reached out and lightly tapped the side of my mud-stained right hand.
"Calluses on the webbing of your thumb and index finger," Kane noted softly.
"That comes from thousands of hours firing a suppressed HK416, not pushing pens at a desk."
I kept my expression completely neutral, refusing to give him an inch.
"And that vault over the eight-foot wall," he continued, a faint smirk returning to his lips.
"I saw a SEAL team in Ramadi clear compound walls the exact same way."
He held the stopwatch up between us, showing me the digital numbers before clicking the reset button.
The digits vanished, erasing the proof of my run.
"Four minutes, fifty-two seconds!" Kane suddenly shouted, turning back to his stunned squad.
"The Lieutenant takes the loss, which means the drinks are on the Navy tonight!"
The Marines blinked in surprise, then erupted into relieved cheers, slapping each other on the back.
I stared at Kane as the squad began walking back toward the barracks.
"Why erase the time?" I asked quietly as the noise faded.
"Because whatever you’re really doing here at Pendleton requires them to think you’re just an admin officer," Kane replied.
He slipped the silver stopwatch back into his pocket and offered me a crisp, genuine nod of respect.
"Welcome to the unit, Lieutenant Cross—my squad is ready whenever you need us."
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