‘So?’
‘You missed something.’
‘You lost me.’
‘You needed to collect the correct five things.’ Agent Gill picked up the final item, the silver cylinder – it shone as the light from the desk lamp hit it.
Ruby was puzzled until her eyes took in what was written down one side of the silver item. BOMB it said.
‘How could I have missed that?’ said Ruby, more to herself than the test invigilator.
‘Plenty of people do,’ said Gill.
‘You’re talking about change blindness? Focusing too much on the main task – missing the detail?’
‘Yes, that’s why some people fail,’ said Agent Gill. ‘But in your case, I think it was because you were being reckless; you lost focus altogether. You got carried away.’
Ruby frowned at him. ‘But I—’
‘You also missed this.’ He pushed a photo over the desk. It showed the water tower Ruby had climbed up and swum through. On its side were large letters spelling the word TOXIC, a skull and crossbones painted beneath.
How could she not have seen that?
‘If you’d noticed the warning,’ he said, ‘you could have used the ladder leaning against the tank, hauled it up, then slid it over the water to create a bridge. I must say, it’s what I expected you to do, given your reputation.’
‘Um. . .’ Ruby was all out of words.
But Agent Gill wasn’t. ‘In addition, had you simply walked around the building where you spotted the flashlight you would have discovered a door. The bunch of keys you picked up would have allowed you access to that door and you could have simply climbed a staircase to the roof instead of bringing the whole roof crashing to the floor and thus blocking your route to the trap door and object three.’
‘Oh,’ said Ruby.
Gill peered at her. ‘Oh indeed,’ he said. ‘From observation, I would have to conclude that you have a curious lack of regard for your own life. A certain fearless approach, causing you to be impulsive rather than considered. You are reacting rather than making decisions – your actions are gambles – and it’s a dangerous way to be when you are in the field. I have to be frank, this is not how I expected you to fail.’
‘You expected me to fail?’ said Ruby.
‘Yes. But in quite a different way. We didn’t think you would make the final leap. I mean we guessed you would try, but you see it was set further than you could jump. Candidates are expected to assess the risk, figure on it being too great and find a better route. But you made it and this surprises us very much.’
‘What can I say,’ said Ruby, dryly, ‘I’m a real good jumper.’
‘Or you got very lucky,’ said Agent Gill. He coughed and reshuffled his papers. ‘Ordinarily you’d be put forward for Stage Three of the Field Agent Training Programme and you would be enrolled on free-climb training at Dry River Canyon. But you’re not going to be recommended for further field work or tuition at this stage.’
‘What?’ said Ruby.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Gill.
‘But I’ve already been sitting things out. I thought this test was about putting me back in?’
‘Not possible,’ said Gill. ‘Not given your current test scores. You’re a danger to yourself and a possible danger to others if you don’t respect your own life.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Ruby, ‘Because I’m not afraid, this makes me some kind of liability?’
‘You are a liability,’ said Gill. ‘Because your apparent lack of fear is clouding your judgement, we can’t risk you out there – besides, you’re someone’s kid.’
‘Isn’t everyone. Aren’t you?’
‘That’s different,’ said Agent Gill, ‘my folks aren’t home waiting for me with milk and cookies.’
‘What? And you think mine are?’ said Ruby, rolling her eyes. ‘I’m thirteen, not three.’
Disappointment wasn’t the word for how Ruby was feeling. Furious might be. Agent Gill had shuffled her along to be assessed by the Spectrum psychiatrists and she was now sitting in Dr Selgood’s calm, book-lined office. Mercifully, she had been handed a towel and was beginning to dry off. Her shoes still hadn’t been returned.
DR SELGOOD: ‘What you have, Redfort, is a condition – it’s a syndrome that survivors of near-fatal accidents sometimes experience. There’s no name for it and there are very few studies on those who experience it but I call it the Miracle Effect. I had a patient who likened it to having an ever-present guardian angel at his side. He feared nothing and no one.’
RUBY: ‘What happened to him?’
DR SELGOOD: ‘He died.’
RUBY: ‘The angel was on a break?’
DR SELGOOD: ‘No one beats death. What you are now dealing with is a sort of euphoria – you don’t believe you can die.’
RUBY: ‘I haven’t so far.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘Doesn’t mean you won’t.’
RUBY: ‘It seems unlikely.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘Which is why you take risks?’
RUBY: ‘The more risks I take the less dead I feel.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘Yet ironically the more likely you are to wind up that way.’
RUBY: ‘I’m not so sure.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘How so?’
RUBY: ‘I read this book once about this kid who believes in the probability of death, a sort of risk assessment of life. He believes if something unlikely has happened one day, like, say a plane lands on your house or a forest fire breaks out and you fall off a cliff, then that particular risk is dealt with because in all probability that ain’t gonna happen twice.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘Here you are talking about statistics and yet you know better than most that just because a plane lands on your house once doesn’t mean it can’t happen again.’
RUBY: ‘True, but it would seem unlucky.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘And you consider yourself to be lucky?’
RUBY: ‘I’d say not many people escape a giant egg timer.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘You’re referring here to the time you were almost buried alive in sand.’
RUBY: ‘I could just as well bring up the time that I was paralysed by jellyfish and nearly eaten alive by sharks.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘And it doesn’t occur to you that perhaps the situation you had put yourself in led to your near demise? And that the reason you escaped with your life is due in part to your training and some pretty advanced gadgetry and in part down to the luck of being rescued in the nick of time?’
RUBY: ‘I couldn’t have put it better myself doc, I am very unlikely to die. I got everything going for me.’
DR SELGOOD: ‘And yet, in your test, you swam through toxic water,