‘Yes. There weren’t that many of them inside. It’s all clear now. I shot a few of them trying to destroy documents, so the operation might have been worth it after all.’
‘Thanks, mate. I owe you,’ Killey said. ‘That was bloody stupid of me.’
‘Aye, you do, and I’ll take payment in cases of beer when we get back.
‘Don’t tell anyone about this, yeah.’
’I won’t, mate. This’ll stay between us,’ Gibbs said.
The night sky to the east was changing to an orange glow in the cloudless morning, and the barrenness of their surroundings became more apparent. Gibbs stood and faced the main buildings that had fallen into silence. Looking down at his hands, he clenched his fists to stop them from shaking. The adrenaline was taking it’s time to dissipate, fuelled by an old anger.
‘You okay, killer?’ Killey said.
Gibbs nodded and looked at three goats that started to work their way down the hillside.
‘You still see your old man’s face every time you kill?’ Killey asked, walking up behind him.
‘It’s crazy, right. After all these years, those memories still send me to a bloody dark place,’ Gibbs said.
‘It’ll get easier over time.’
He turned to see his friend holding out an open pack of cigarettes. He took one and looked down at it, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger.
‘Jesus, Killey, are you smoking plain cigarettes now?’
‘All I could get my hands on before we left camp,’ he replied, lighting both their cigarettes with a single match.
‘After surviving my old man’s drunken beatings for all those years, it would be a shame to die because of these bloody cancer sticks,’ Gibbs chuckled, taking a long draw and instantly feeling himself relax.
‘Less moaning about the past, more living for the future?’ Killey said, patting Gibbs’s shoulder.
• • •
After thirty minutes of waiting and keeping a very groggy Mike Johnson company, Gibbs could make out the figures of Whitey Lawson and a radioman making their way towards him. He signalled to let them know that all was secure in their building.
‘Any major problems here?’ Whitey Lawson asked, glancing at the bodies of the men lying outside of the building.
‘Nothing we couldn’t handle, sir,’ Gibbs said. ‘There is a load of documents lying around inside plus a few old filing cabinets in the main room. They might be of interest to the intelligence boys.’
‘Good job, Gibbs,’ Whitey Lawson said, slapping him on the back. ‘We rotate out at ten hundred hours, so wait for the intelligence boys to arrive, then get back to the vehicles. Beers are on me this evening.’
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Other books by Wayne Marinovich
The Kyle Gibbs Series
Gibbs- The early years
(a short story)
CELT - book 1
Phoenix - book 2
Kharon - book 3
Anhur - book 4
The Hudson Drake Series
IGAZI
ORANG
TIGER
Published Short Stories
FLOODLANDERS
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Acknowledgements
To my parents, Mark and Jenny, for allowing me to spend time reading, instead of doing my chores.
To all the teachers at boarding school, who believed my bullshit excuses at evening study, and allowed me to do my homework in the school library. There, I escaped from the boring world.
A big thank you to The Grill. Aberdeen, Scotland where I sipped whisky and watched the character of Kyle Gibbs come to life.
Author Bio
Many of you know about my passion for our planet. I write about it, and I try to capture its wonders through the wildlife and landscape photographs that I take.
For as long as I can remember I have loved reading books and studying nature. Growing up on a farm in South Africa meant that I was always out and about, up to mischief somewhere. My imagination flourished and ran wild as I spent my childhood sitting in trees, climbing on rooftops, fishing in our local dam and bird watching from one of the hides that I built.
My love of the outdoors developed in those early years and my passion for all things wild and natural meant that my reading, writing and photography inevitably followed that path.
Now, many years later, I am moving ahead with writing and photography on a more serious basis. I hope my passion for conservation and environmental issues will make some small contribution to opening people's eyes to the beauty and fragility of the planet we live on. I intend to use my writing as one of a few platforms to share my creative content and the content of others who share the same passions.
The first major environmental piece of work that I am working on is the Kyle Gibbs series. A series set in a climate changed world, which is a topic very close to my heart. The second series follows the main character’s journey to right the wrongs that we’ve inflicted on the planet.
I invite you to take this journey with me and look forward to chatting with you as we go.
Gibbs- the Early Years Page 6
