One by one, the others began to open up. Good. Communication, exchange. “Nice to have someone with more than basic medical expertise. Here’s hoping we don’t need you.” Yekaterina raised the empty glass in a mock toast in Bethan’s direction as the other woman revealed an impressive range of experiences and traits, “And an explosives guy, okay, glad to hear that. I’m going to leave any potential demolition stuff to you, my track record with that... isn’t great.” There was a brief, yet perceptible pause as she thought of a way to phrase it without using words such as ‘clusterfuck’ and ‘stereotypical Russian disaster’ “And sorry, no fistfights with bears. Wildest thing I’ve wrestled were shitfaced Londoners.” The Russian chuckled. Hayden’s resume was also a cause for optimism, apparently full service in special forces, unlike Bethan’s unfortunately aborted training, under the paranoid canuck’s belt. With her turn to speak, she leaned in closer so she could lower her voice a bit, seeing no reason to openly flaunt different allegiances that might make people question their presence and motives, masking the motion by reaching for the bottle and pouring herself another shot. “As for me, I’m Main Intelligence Directorate special forces, you’re probably more familiar with the old designation, GRU. A door kicker by training. Mechanical, ballistic, explosive, thermal, the lot. Not like we’ll need, or find for the matter, more than irons here. Aside from that, I’m originally motorized infantry, so I’m pretty familiar with the operation and basic maintenance of vehicles, mainly older Soviet trucks and four by fours, and speak German.”

Their little bonding was interrupted by the arrival of a corporate-looking type. Guy looked like he had more money than Ukraine. Definitely looked out of place in a country like this. She hadn’t even noticed his arrival. Idiot, pay attention. His offer seemed decent though. They couldn’t afford to be picky this early on, so a simple-looking task to bring a guy over - with no penalty for damaged goods no less - seemed like a continuation of the good fortune smiling upon them, compared to the shitfest that was personal protection, frontline combat or other grunt work assignments they could’ve been saddled with as unproven new hires, each with a hundred and one ways it could go horribly wrong. Of course this could still get complicated. Uncooperative driver, driver in the middle of transporting half a platoon of COGS-affiliated mercs, driver getting killed by some passer by for looking at him in a weird way... After witnessing a convoy of mercs throwing fliers tied to rocks at vehicles on the highway, she had a feeling everything was on the table, at least it would seem that way until they got used to how things were in Matanbai.

Standing up to see Victor, the Russian nodded at the offer. “20 diamonds doesn’t tell us tourists much. What’s that worth, can you give us some examples? And is haggling with traders the norm here like in, say, Tunisia, or is it frowned upon?” She wanted to know, not even bothering with attempting to hide how clueless she was about how things in Matanbai worked, inwardly wishing unspeakable things on the person who sent her into the middle of bumblefuck nowhere, Africa, with what could not be by any metric considered adequate intelligence. “Wouldn’t happen to have a picture of the driver, would you?” she asked, trying to remember if Gunther’s truck had any markings like the one presented on it. That would’ve been an ironic twist.