Immediate Action by Andy McNab Page A

we put it in the drying room for a while, then rested it on our bergens for the next day.
        After a while we did start talking to one another, but the only topic was Selection. Every time I came back off a day's tabbing I wanted to find out how many people had been binned. The more people the better. I was chuffed that thirty people failed the Fan Dance.
        Great, I thought, it made me feel as if I was doing well.
        The daily tabs now ranged from fifteen to sixty-four kilometers, and night marches were introduced. Day after day it was the same routine.
        We'd get the timings to go on the wagons in the morning, go to where the tab was going to start, do it, and get back at night.
        Then the Darby and Joan Club would go shuffling back to the rooms, dump their kit, put their stuff in the drying room, have a bath or a shower, have something to eat, and get their heads down. The days of Guinness and chips were over.
        Nobody told us the timings for the day, so we didn't know how far we were going, where we were going, what route we were taking, or how long we had; we had no option but to go as fast as we could, and that was where the map-reading skills came in. If I came to a reentrant (valley), I didn't go down and then up; I'd see if it might be worth contouring around the longer distance.
        Discipline was uncalled for. All they'd say was "Be in the quadrangle for six o'clock." We'd turn up; they'd call out our names and tell us what trucks to get on. The majority of people were getting in their sleeping bags or putting their bobble hats on, resting and drinking flasks of tea. Then, all too soon, we'd get to the checkpoint, clamber out, and they'd call us forward one by one and send us on our way.
        The training team told us nothing. We were the ones who wanted to be there; they weren't soliciting for our custom. Their attitude seemed to be: The course is here if you want to do it.
        "Red fifteen?"
        I went over to the DS.
        "Name?"
        "McNab."
        "Where are you?"
        I had to show him on the map where I was. If you put your finger on a map, you're covering an area of five hundred or six hundred meters-unless you've got big stubby fingers, in which case it might be a kilometer.
        You've got to point exactly where you are with a blade of grass or a twig.
        "You are going to Grid four-four-one-three-five-three.
        Show me where that is."
        I showed him.
        "Show me what direction you are going in."
        I took my bearing and showed him.
        He said, "Well you'd better get started because the clock's running."
        There, was one bloke in my group, Trey, who was so hyper and revved up that he ended up doing everything the wrong way around.
        Instead of going north, he would go south. He got off the wagon one day and got called over by the DS.
        He said, "Where are you?"
        He showed him on the map.
        "Which way are you going?"
        He pointed the way he was going, which was correct, then went off in totally the wrong direction.
        The DS turned around to us and said, "Where the hell's he going?"
        He let him go for about a hundred meters, then shouted: "Oi, dickhead, come back here! For fuck's sake, where are you going? Show us your bearing."
        Trey showed him, and the DS said, "Then fucking go in that direction.
        You've already wasted three minutes."
        A lot of the time, if I was going for a high point, I could see it, and it never got any closer. My mind would start wandering off on to different things. Sometimes I'd start singing stupid songs to myself in my mind, or little advertising that I'd always hated anyway.
        I'd get to the checkpoint and lean forward, my hands on my knees to rest the shoulders.
        The DS'd say, "Show me where you are." Then: "You are going to Grid three-four-five-six-seven-eight. Show me