Survivor (The Ashes Book 36) by William W. Johnstone

Author:William W. Johnstone [Johnstone, William W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2014-03-31T11:00:00+00:00

FOURTEEN

The debriefing by Kindhand and the other Rebels of Morty Rosen took a half hour. Jim attended the questioning, but the interesting thing was that the way Kindhand conducted it, it seemed more like a conversation than a debriefing or an interrogation, which, about one-third of the way through Kindhand’s gentle, conversational style, complete with laughs and anecdotes, he realized it was. The result was that Rosen was very relaxed, and Jim was sure that he would remember more details and come forth with more information because he was more relaxed than he might have been had Kindhand come on hard.

Rosen told the Rebels all the salient details on the escape unit, the bloodhounds without larynxes, how they were lightly armed so they could travel rapidly, and how all were in excellent physical condition so they could cover a lot of terrain quickly. In fact, they wore light, ridged shoes that could negotiate the forest floor quickly and light clothing that would not impede their progress.

“They don’t train like other troops,” Rosen told Kindhand at one point, “because they’re not engaged in assaults on other forces or towns. Their only job is to run down escapees.”

“But you don’t have someone try to escape every day, do you, Morty?” Kindhand asked.

“I have nothing to do with it,” Morty said with a laugh, and Kindhand laughed at the ambiguity of the question.

“So what does the unit do while they’re not running after other people?”

“They work around the compound, keeping weaponry shipshape, working on vehicles and other equipment, doing odd jobs for the premier. But they definitely don’t work as hard as other troops.”

“Why?”

“Because they are special. They’ve been selected from the force at large to become part of the escape unit. It’s the equivalent of someone being selected to be a SEAL—you remember them?”

“Sure. And their leader is a guy named Krill?”

“Yeah.”

“What kind of guy is he?”

“He’s a stickler for training and rules. He’ll train you until your butt drops off on the road.”

“Do you know his background?”

“Just that he was a mercenary. You can tell by the way he conducts himself that he’s been in the military a long time.”

“And what about our friend Alex Szabo?”

“A lot,” Jim piped in. “Do you think you could show Duke the report from the psychologist on Szabo?”

Jim had made his comment in a very low-key way, and Rosen immediately went and got the doctor’s devastating report from his backpack on the persona of Alex Szabo. Kindhand read it quickly and handed it around for the other Rebels to read.

“Well,” Kindhand said when everyone was finished reading the document, “the Apache have a name to describe his personality.”

“What’s that?” Jim asked.

“Lakuna da freede.”

“What does that mean?” Jim asked.

“He’s three quarts low.”

Everyone, including Rosen, laughed.

Rosen, using the excellent Rebel maps, showed them where Compound W was, and estimated that it was forty-three and a half miles away. Kindhand, therefore, did not expect them to arrive for a number of hours. How many was hard to say because Rosen was not able to say what their rate would be.

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