Werner Herzog: The Zec

Jack Reacher

The Zec

Jack Reacher: With a name like yours, you're gonna feel right at home.
The Zec: Prison? In America? A retirement home. If I go to prison at all.
Jack Reacher: You think you're gonna walk?
The Zec: You are a homeless drifter wanted for murder. Meanwhile, I am an old man in the wrong place at the wrong time. Thanks to you, who is left to say otherwise? Who?

Linsky: I made a mistake. I mean, you can still use me, just, just tell me how to fix...
The Zec: To survive. Don't say "fix it," because you can't. We covered up the one mess. You made another.
Linsky: All right. You're right. You're right. You're absolutely right. I'm sorry. Just, tell me what I have to do.
The Zec: I was in prison in Siberia. I spent my first winter wearing a dead man's coat. A hole in one pocket. I chewed these fingers off before the frostbite could turn to gangrene. These I gave up to avoid working in the sulfur mine. That is how I survived when so many others did not. A man this rare can always be of use. So show me. Show me you are rare. Show me you'll do anything to survive.
Linsky: I don't understand.
The Zec: The fingers from your left hand.
Linsky: Have you... Have you got a knife?
The Zec: Did I have a knife in Siberia?
Linsky: No... Come on, you've, you've got to be kidding.
The Zec: You can do it. Show me.
Linsky: [tries to chew his thumb off] Christ! Can't! I can't.
The Zec: Always the bullet.
Linsky: I can't!
The Zec: I don't understand.
[Charlie shoots Linsky]

The Zec: Enough? There is no such thing. We take what can be taken. This is what we do.