Any satisfaction Warrick felt from their exchange soon evaporated when he felt the truck lurch forward in an uncomfortable reminder that it was still the middle of the night and he'd still been hauled out to do regiment tech work that should've been handled internally. He slid sideways on the hard bench as the truck bounced along, pride forcing him to keep his hands down instead of bracing against the sides like he wanted to do. It wasn't going to be a comfortable ride. He thought about his own car conveniently parked at the garage beside the compound, and the driver on call that he could have easily directed to take him to the base camp in air-conditioned comfort at a reasonable hour of the morning and scowled.

S.O.P. my ass, he thought uncharitably. This is Tillotson trying his best to irritate me. And succeeding, damn it all.

At least the commander had issued him a moderately interesting escort. The soldier had seemed mildly impressed by his boldness and yet somehow condescending about it, as if he couldn't quite believe Warrick's audacity. Most people, he knew, shut their mouths in face of so much intimidating uniform and weapons attached to twitchy trigger fingers. Warrick was far too used to getting his own way to be cowed by a gun he knew would not be fired in his direction. He was far too valuable an asset for that and besides, there were rules about shooting civilians.

Not, he figured, that the rules actually counted for anyone but expatriated and wealthy British nationals around here. How many innocents had been ripped apart by the man sitting across from him, just as a matter of course? A job statistic. The grim calculus of war. How sickening.

"I'm sure once would be more than enough to leave a permanent scar," he said, anger leaving his voice clipped and cold and only somewhat ruined by the jouncing he was getting from the truck.