The rest of the class was stood looking to see how Ward would react to this.
They saw him walk up to her, say something they couldn't hear, before he took Tilly's legs out from under her so quick she couldn't respond and she landed in the water with a splash.
It sent a clear message to everyone – DO NOT HIT WARD AROUND THE FACE WITH A FISH.
Carl, however was close enough to hear what Ward said to her.
"This is for the tie wrap. We are nowhere close to being even."
He pondered on it, missing catching a few fish that butted up against his legs.
"Don't you all look like you're having fun?" Toby called from the bank.
"What are you doing here? I thought Agent Ward was leading this?" Mike asked.
"He is, but we only make you suffer for one night the first time out." Toby explained to them.
"I wonder what he means by that?" Carl asked Tilly, momentarily distracted from Ward's words to her.
"It means that he's brought tents, food, matches and I hope to God some dry clothes." Tilly explained, noticing the van parked on the edge of the clearing.
"You have ten minutes to catch some fish, or you aren't going to eat any lunch!" Ward announced to the startled group.
Tilly lunged into the water and grabbed a fish by the tail in each hand. Pulling them out Carl took one off her, not wanting a repeat of the last one she caught.
Together they climbed out of the river and onto the bank.
"Toby, please tell me you have some dry clothes in that van?" Tilly asked.
"Why are you so wet?"
"Ward decked her because she managed to hit him with a fish." Carl told him.
To Carl's surprise Toby started laughing, before waving Tilly over to the van. Carl went to gather some wood to build a fire, before realising Tilly had the matches, which would now be wet through.
"He decked you because you hit him with a fish? I'm surprised you didn't duck him." Toby asked Tilly in a quiet voice as he located her a new suit.
"I tie wrapped him to a chair and embarrassed him and I kind of took one for the team. Can you imagine what people would say if I'd have tripped him?. Last time he tried that we both ended up getting wet." Tilly explained.
Now it made sense to Toby. He pulled a suit out and handed it to Tilly. She went over to the nearest set of bushes and quickly changed behind it, emerging and rejoining Carl as he was gutting the fish.
"You have the, what I assume to be, useless and dripping wet matches." Carl said to her, nodding to the fire.
"Seriously. What exactly do you take me for? My matches are waterproof." Tilly said to him, pulling them out of her belt. This made Carl smile. She thought of everything.
Tilly lit the fire while Carl finished preparing the fish. Together they wrapped them in fresh leaves and put them in the fire.
They looked around as their fish cooked. Other pairs weren't doing so well. There was one pair that hadn't managed to catch anything at all and were now sat unhappily to one side watching everyone prepare a meal. Most pairs had caught at least one fish between them and were now being taught by Toby how to gut them and remove the bones. The pairs that already knew how to do that were being taught by Ward how to light a fire.
All of them were throwing Carl and Tilly dirty looks.
"Do you ever get the feeling that we're unpopular." Carl asked Tilly as Mike threw him the dirtiest look imaginable.
"Sometimes, but we have both clearly done this before so why do we need to spend time learning?" Tilly replied, using a stick to turn their fish over.
"How have you done this before? I mean you don't seem to be the outdoorsy type of girl."
"My brother used to take me camping every summer. We used fish, sit by a fire and make smores, set snares to see what we could catch for dinner. It was so much fun. Then my sister started coming and it got even better because I had help pulling pranks on him." Tilly told him reminiscing.
"Sounds like fun."
"It was. The only thing I struggled with was the skinning and gutting of the fish and animals. If I had to do it I refused to eat it. So my brother did it for me."
"Which is why you're trying to avoid it now?"
"I'm not trying to avoid." Tilly protested, before Carl raised his eyebrows at her and she realised he was right. He had done it all.
"I'll make you a deal. I will skin and gut the meals, if you tell me what's going on with you and Toby."
Tilly stared at him before realising Carl thought there was something going on between them.
"There's nothing going on between us."
"I saw him walk you to your room the other night after you caught me going through your things."
"Yeah. I was out of bed after curfew. He was helping me not get shot."
"But why were you out of bed after curfew?"
"When I signed up to this Director Fury added a few classes to my timetable to make sure I stayed engaged and out of trouble."
"Why would he think you would get into trouble?"
"It's who I am."
"You're a prankster?"
"Did you not get that when I put that newt on Sarah's shoulder?"
Carl laughed. This year was about to get more fun.
"So what classes do you take that we don't?"
"There's a science one. They let me do sciencey things during it. I'm currently working on a communications bracelet."
"I get a feeling there's more."
"Advanced combat."
"Yeah, right. Whatever." Carl scoffed. Tilly knew it was time not to elaborate.
"The fish is done." She told him, adding a cool tone to her voice.
They pulled the fish out of the fire and sat in silence while they ate it. Tilly watched as Toby and Ward went around everyone and corrected their methods.
That's when she saw it.
As he stood up, Tilly saw Ward wince slightly as he twisted.
"He's been shot" Tilly said under her breath.
"What? Who?" Carl asked her.
"Agent Ward. He's been shot. That's why he's free for this."
"Get outta here. There's no way."
"Dare you to ask him and find out."
"You ask him. I'm not that suicidal!"
"Agent Ward?" Tilly said in a loud voice.
"What?"
"We were just wondering if you're here because you got shot?" Tilly asked him, not a shadow of fear on her face.
Carl registered a look of shock briefly flash over Ward's face and knew Tilly was right. How she had spotted it he had no idea.
"What makes you say that?"
"You wince when you move." Tilly said, looking at the floor after realising how creepy it sounded.
The class sat in awe of Tilly. She didn't seem to be afraid of anything, especially this large, legendary Agent in front of them, who was not known for his sense of humour.
"That's part of the reason. I took two bullets to the side. Nothing much, just a flesh wound. I also had some business to take care of in the area." Ward admitted to the class.
"Can we see the bullet holes?" a girl with short brown hair asked him, taking her cue from Tilly.
"No." Ward told her while flashing the class his trademark, as Tilly called it, homicidal look.
The class immediately went back to what they were doing. Tilly on the other hand made an excuse to go and check the snares. Ward followed her.
"Was that really necessary?" he asked her in a low voice.
"I told Carl to do it, but for some reason people are scared of you. Don't they know you're a softy who used to gut my meals because I've never been able to do it myself." Tilly asked him, copying his low voice.
"No, and if you want to keep it that way you better stop with the personal questions." Ward warned her.
"Fine! But the next time you tell me to 'take one for the team' I will seriously consider hurting you." Tilly said inspecting the snares.
Ward watched as she found a rabbit in one and jumped to try and reach it. He let out a laugh over how ridiculous she looked before taking pity on her and getting it down.
"And if you don't want people to know, you better stop helping me. I'm just another student remember, Sir." Tilly warned, taking the rabbit off him.
"Hey Tilly. Give me back that rabbit. I have an idea."
"First years. How many of you know how to skin a rabbit?" Ward asked when he got back to camp.
Not one of them stuck their hand in the air.
"I'm going to teach you how to skin, gut and roast a rabbit on an open fire." Ward announced.
"With What?" Mike asked.
"I believe Matilda and Carl have just checked their snares and have caught one."
Tilly nodded while Carl asked her: "Did we?"
Tilly handed it over to Ward and looked away as he expertly prepared the rabbit to roast. She suddenly saw the knife he was using and the urge to cry "You git. That's my knife" was swallowed.
He walked over to their fire which was still burning well. Tilly had fed it some more wood when she got back from the snares.
Ward set up a spit roast using the straightest sticks he could find and showed them how to cook meat over open fire.
Spurred on by Tilly and Carl's snare success everyone else wanted to go and check theirs, but Toby told them what their plans for the afternoon were.
"Before you go and check your snares you will get one pack per pair off the van and set up your camp properly. If you need another suit, come and see me and I will give you one."
The afternoon was spent pitching tents and throwing sleeping bags into them. Like most things, some of the class had done it before and managed to pitch the tents in a relatively short space of time, while it took others, who had never camped before longer. Once all of the pairs had a pack one of the junior members of staff took the van back to Phys Acc.
"Now we have a tent we'll be fine. I go camping in the holidays all the time." Mike announced to his partner Brad as they knocked the last peg in.
"So you can skin and roast a rabbit?" Brad asked him.
"Of course I can." Mike told him.
Tilly was about to open her mouth to say something, but she noticed Ward shake his head.
She saw his eyes turn blue and followed his eyeline. He was looking right at the one peg that would cause the entire tent to collapse. Tilly smiled and went back to helping Sarah pitch hers.
"What the hell! I thought you said you could pitch a tent!" Brad shouted at Mike.
"I can. I don't know why but these pegs keep coming out!" Mike answered back.
Eventually all of the tents were pitched except theirs. For some reason, that only Tilly and Ward knew, the pegs simply wouldn't stay in the ground. The entire class was now watching them struggle. Toby stepped forwards to help them, but Ward held him back.
"They need to learn a lesson." Ward told him.
"Have you tried moving it?" Carl asked, thinking the ground may be too soft for the pegs.
"Yeah! Twice!" Brad wailed.
Tilly saw Ward dig one more peg out before stepping in to help them pitch it.
"Are you guys sure you're hitting the pegs in right?"
"YES!" Mike shouted.
Ward made short work of the tent's pegs and handed the mallet to them. When the pegs stayed in the ground they started cursing at each other.
Toby smacked them both around the back of the heads.
"There is no need for language like that." Ward told them gruffly.
"Alright everyone. Go check your snares." Toby instructed them.
"I'll go. You checked the last one." Carl said to Tilly as she made to get to her feet.
"You sure?"
"Yeah. I'm sure."
Toby heard a scream and after passing a quick look with Ward went to investigate.
"That was inspired." Tilly said to Ward when they found themselves alone in the clearing.
"I thought it might take him down a peg or two better than a verbal whiplashing from you."
"I think you may be right. By the way, gimmie my damn knife back." Tilly told him, holding out her hand.
Ward reached into his weapons belt and passed her knife back to her. Toby arrived back in the clearing.
"Everything ok?" Ward asked.
"Yeah. One of the idiots managed to get caught in a snare."
Tilly laughed and went to help Carl, who she had seen coming out of the woods with three more rabbits. Tilly took one over to a rock and took her knife out. She held it to the neck of the rabbit before backing up.
"I can't do this." She said closing her knife and walking back to the stream.
"Tilly." Carl shouted, standing up from his own rabbit and trying to follow her.
"Leave her." Ward warned him. He knew Tilly and knew that nothing Carl would say would make her skin the rabbit.
"I'll prep it, you go talk to her." Toby told him.