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>Talk to bodyguards & get their angles; offer smokes/drinks if need be to get them to loosen up/gain favor
You reach into the interior pocket of your jacket, extract a pack of Marlboro Red cigarettes, and break the seal, and gently slide out a stick and place it to your lips. Transferring the pack to your other hand, you reach into the same pocket and pull out your lighter, ignite the cigarette, and enjoy the first cloy of smoke slowing expanding to fill your whole mouth with rich tobacco taste.
You extend the arm containing the Marlboros and give it a firm upward shake so that the ends of the cigarettes stick out and are made easy to grab. The gift thus proffered, it is gladly accepted by all three men sharing the rear seats with you. The driver does not turn around nor seem aware of the goings-on in the back.
Anywhere and at any time in history, the simple and excellent formula for ingratiating yourself with soldiers has always been to offer food, drink, and smokes. Each time your lit cigarette is passed and used to light those of the others, it joins you in a covenant with these men. They talk easily, albeit joltingly, stopping themselves when they fear they have become too easy in the presence of you, their superior officer. They talk mainly of rations, past details, their hopes of victory, the villages and towns from which they came. The reflections on topics of interest to you are limited, it is clear they know less than you about their mission and are more satisfied with this state of affairs:
-“Don’t know where Gordon is. Couldn’t find it on the map”
-“We’re attached to you, sir, that’s what I know. An honor too, guarding a war hero. The Republians are bastards and they’d be just the kind to do it unfair. Can’t win on the front, so they sneak behind the lines. It’s cause they’re cowards. Bastard cowards”
-“My brother-in-law is an Internal Ministry soldier. He’s a bastard, thinks he can do whatever. Not real soldiers. Put them on the front and they couldn’t take it. Easy to be tough when the other side doesn’t have guns”
-“Never heard of the 216th Battalion. They must not have been where I was.”
You already know their names, it is right there on their uniforms: Matsukov B., Slavorenko I., Rashidaliev F. From the conversation, you gather than Slavorenko is quicker than the other two, some of his responses show some real thought. Feliks Rashidaliev is talkative, it is how you know what the ‘F.’ on his uniform stands for. You seem to excite him, he likes being on detail with a war hero. It is hard to get a read on Matsukov, he is not overly quiet but what he says doesn’t give out much.
>Any other questions Gennady? Things you would like to ask the men before you all arrive in Gordon?
