How It All Goes Down
Double O Nothing
- It's a dark, cloudy day, and Alex is on a training mission. His task is to lug his massive twenty-two-pound backpack to the final rendezvous point.
- Alex was attached to K-Unit by his sergeant, who's the "sort of man who thought he'd seen everything" (5.5); the sergeant makes it abundantly clear that he doesn't like a kid joining his group.
- Each member of K-Unit is given a cool code name; Alex's peers are Wolf, Fox, Eagle, and Snake. Alex gets the codename "Cub." Wolf leads the group and, like the sergeant, he doesn't like Alex too much.
- Meanwhile, K-Unit creates another nickname for Alex: "Double O Nothing" (5.19). One time, Wolf even tries to strike Alex in the face while they're in an obstacle course. But things don't go bad until they get to the Killing House.
- The Killing House is a booby-trapped building meant to simulate a hostage-rescue operation. The team reaches the exit with little trouble, but Wolf knocks Alex over as he is about to leave, and Alex falls into a trip wire that launches a stun grenade straight into his face.
- Alex wakes up in shock. The sergeant grills him about what happened, but Alex refuses to rat Wolf out. That doesn't end up mattering, though, because the sergeant punishes the whole group with a grueling "thirty-mile hike" (5.42) the following day.
- Alex ends up making pretty good time, although the rest of the squad reaches the finish line about three hours before he does. The sergeant, smoking a cigarette, tells Alex that he knows what really happened in the Killing House, and we can tell that Alex is earning his respect.
- When he reaches the camp, he sees Wolf struggling to build a fire, so Alex tosses him a book of matches that he just pickpocketed from the sergeant.