Brass Monkey: A James Acton Thriller Book #2 by J Robert Kennedy

minutes. How can you love her?
    His master stopped and walked back to Faisal. Lowering his voice, he said, “Listen, son, it is all part of the ritual. You are now no longer my apprentice. You are an Hassassin. You passed your final test. All Hassassins go through the ritual where you are made to believe you were killed and have awoken in Jannah, then after a blissful hour, you fall asleep again after drinking some wine, fed to you by a beautiful woman, then wake in our infirmary with a nasty knock on the head. It is the Right of Initiation.”
    “But why?”
    “So you know what you are fighting for!”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “Every Hassassin thinks he has died, sees what paradise is like, then awakes, thinking he has been brought back to life by Allah. He then serves Allah without question, knowing that his reward should he die in battle is paradise, a paradise that he has experienced.”
    “Everyone has done this?”
    “Yes.”
    “And they all know?”
    Hasni shook his head. “Of course not, only the training masters know. It is a tradition handed down for over a century, from one training master to the next. I remember when I was told, how shocked I was. I even felt betrayed, as I am sure you do now, but then I realized the brilliance of it. Paradise—Jannah. Few men ever experience anything like it while living. We all have. And it is a wonderful thing. Keep it fresh in your mind, boy, for it is something to keep you alive, and something to die for.”
    Faisal stared at the ground. It was all a lie.
    “Look out!” yelled Hasni.
    Faisal jerked his head up as Hasni grabbed him by the robe and yanked him into a nearby doorway. A volley of arrows had cleared the outer wall and rained down on the courtyard they stood in.
    Hasni spun Faisal around to face him and stared him in the eyes. “We are under attack. Are you a Hassassin or are you a coward?”
    Faisal took a deep breath through his nose, the scent from the pool still fresh on his skin filled his nostrils, the memory of what had almost happened sent a surge through his loins. Then he realized what it all meant. “I am Hassassin!” he said with a surge of pride. “I am no coward.”
    Hasni smiled and squeezed Faisal’s shoulders. “Good, good. Now let’s get in this fight, brother.”
     

 
     
     
    Southeast District Police Headquarters, Kashirskoye Street, Moscow
    Interrogation Room 1
     
    The interrogation room at the Southeast District Police Headquarters would have horrified any American tourist unfortunate enough to find themselves in it. A single incandescent bulb burned hot in the center of the room, its cheap shade serving to focus the light down over the lone table. The table, made from a sturdy oak, was a fixture in the station house for years. Hit with weapons, fists, prisoners’ heads, and more, tossed over and thrown on too many occasions to count, pock marks, splinters and chips covered its surface. The times it was broken, the men at the precinct would repair it, rather than have it replaced. It had been there as long as the precinct had been, and it brought them good luck. More cases broke at that table than any other in Moscow. Whether true or not was irrelevant, but it was the story they told the rookies, and the myth was perpetuated. It had been there so many decades the story very well might be true by now.
    Yakovski was handcuffed, sitting in an uncomfortable metal chair, staring at the floor. He raised his foot and dropped it on a cockroach unfortunate enough to pass within his field of vision. He twisted his boot, grinding the insect into the filth covered floor, its original color anybody’s guess.
    Dymovsky watched the proceedings through the two way mirror. They had run the man’s fingerprints and confirmed he was Yakovski. Dymovsky had refamiliarized himself with the man’s military history, which was the last information they had on him. In August 1991 he had disappeared, with the rest of his unit from 1985,