The Wrong Stuff td-125

by Warren Murphy

  "You are correct," Smith said gravely. "Our adversary is far more dangerous than any of us realized." He glanced up at Howard. "You have analyzed some of CURE's operations database. Have you reached the section on Mr. Gordons?"

  Mark shook his head. "I don't think so," he admitted. "What's his first name?" he asked, hoping to jog his memory.

  "He-or rather, it-doesn't have one," Smith explained. "Gordons is an artificially created entity built by the space program. He has the form of a man, but he is not human. He was meant to be utilized for interstellar exploration, but he escaped from his lab years ago and has been at large ever since. CURE has encountered him on numerous occasions over the course of the last two and a half decades."

  As he stood beside Smith, Mark Howard's face was perfectly flat. Moving only his eyes, he looked from the picture of the Virgil probe to the CURE director's serious face.

  "I'm not sure what to make of this, Dr. Smith," he ventured cautiously.

  "I know it sounds absurd," Smith agreed, "but you need only review the material we have collected on Gordons to see that it is true. In point of fact, science has nearly caught up with his design in the years since his creation. There have been great advances in robotics, computer science, artificial intelligence and miniaturization. At the time of his creation he might have seemed like science fiction, but science fact is rapidly catching up with him."

  Mark already knew from experience that CURE dealt with things that seemed somewhat out of the ordinary. And the truth was Mark Howard himself somewhat fit the mold of extranormal phenomena.

  "All right," he offered. "I'll review the Gordons data. But if what you're saying is true, he'd technically be an android. A machine in human form. What does he have to do with this?" He nodded to the image on the computer.

  "Gordons is more than just a simple android," Smith said, exhaling. "He was programmed to survive. It is a command that supersedes all others. In his quest to survive, he is able to assimilate all materials from his environment necessary to fulfill that function. During Remo and Chiun's last encounter with him six years ago, they disposed of Gordons's brain housing in a Mexican volcano. At the time I had hoped that his metallic components would melt in the magma. If not, it would not matter so much, for he was finally isolated. Left in a place where there was no hope of assimilating the material, he would need to remake himself."

  In a flash Howard had a moment of intuitive clarity.

  "The Virgil probe," the young man announced. "It's supposed to be used on hostile planets. They would have had to simulate an alien environment to see if it worked. NASA must have brought it to that volcano for testing." He nodded to himself, not waiting for a response. "They sent it down there and it found something it didn't expect. Whatever was left of your Mr. Gordons must have assimilated the probe."

  "It appears that is the case," Smith agreed. "I have reviewed NASA's internal data. They brought Virgil to the Popocatepetl volcano late last week. It was only a few days after it was brought back to the United States that the first spider sighting took place in Florida. I am almost certain we are dealing with Gordons." He glanced up at Howard. "However, Remo and Chiun are unaware it is him."

  The assistant CURE director's brow creased. "But they'll be safe, right?" he asked, his voice troubled. "I mean, they've beaten this thing before."

  "Mr. Gordons is no ordinary foe. Yes, they have succeeded in neutralizing him in the past, but not without great difficulty. And I fear complacency might be their enemy this time. If they are certain in their belief that Gordons is dead, the risk to them increases."

  Mark straightened, a determined cast to his soft jaw. "Then I'll fly to Maine and warn them."

  "You would not reach them in time," Smith said. "They are already on the ground there."

  Standing beside Smith's desk, Mark Howard felt a surge of impotent frustration. He clenched and unclenched his hands, unsure what to do.

  Outside, night had taken firm hold. The grounds beyond Smith's one-way picture window had been swallowed up by an impenetrable cloak of blackness.

  "There must be something we can do," Howard insisted.

  Smith nodded. "Yes, there is," he said. Still seated, the older man looked up over the tops of his rimless glasses. "We will remain at Folcroft and use CURE's resources to uncover who at NASA is responsible for the events in Florida. Someone there has been directing Gordons in the guise of the Virgil probe. If Remo and Chiun succeed in Maine, we will send them back to Florida to deal with his accomplices."

  "And if they fail?" Howard asked.

  Smith didn't miss a beat. "Then CURE will be without its enforcement arm and you will have gotten your wish."

  Turning from his subordinate, he began typing swiftly at his computer keyboard.

  Smith's words were not said as a rebuke. Still, they stung. Mark was at a loss for words. He turned woodenly.

  Feeling the weight of his own earlier suggestion on his broad shoulders, Mark Howard quietly left the office.

  Chapter 23

  The darkness through which he fell was complete. There wasn't so much as a trace of light for his eyes to absorb.

  Slipping through this shaft of utter darkness, Chiun kept his arms bent slightly, his fingers extended.

  He didn't know what to expect. When the trapdoor had opened beneath him in the secret passage upstairs, he couldn't move out of the way quickly enough. It was the same strange sense he and Remo had gotten from the falling chandelier. There had been no triggering of hinges or hasps. It was as if the trapdoor had made the decision to open up and swallow him entirely of its own volition.

  As he rocketed through empty space, a sudden pressure against his eardrums told him something flat and solid was racing up toward his feet. The tube was sealed.

  He expected to drop onto the invisible floor, but the instant before he hit, the ink-black tube through which he was plunging split like a yawning mouth. Dim light flooded the tunnel. Chiun caught a flash of a slick black wall as he was spit from the tube. Free, he plunged out into open air.

  Chiun's kimono became a billowing parachute as he floated to the dirt floor. On landing, his sandal soles made not so much as a single scuff.

  He quickly scanned his surroundings.

  He had fallen into the basement. The high brick walls were ancient. Icicles of dry mortar hung from between the bricks.

  The room in which he'd fallen appeared to be sealed. There was no sign of window or door.

  The floor beneath his feet was level, but two yards off it began to slope rapidly downward into a separate alcove. Shadows drenched the farthest recesses of this pit.

  There were no signs of life anywhere in the room. Still, his experiences thus far in this strange house were enough that he would not trust all to be as it should.

  Senses straining alertness, Chiun turned to the nearest wall. He hadn't taken a single step toward it when he detected sudden movement behind him.

  He wheeled around.

  From the darkness of the alcove a long, low figure was slithering into view. Dark and menacing, it moved swiftly on short legs across the dirt floor.

  A second creature emerged behind it, followed by a third. Elongated mouths smiled rows of viciously sharp teeth. As powerful jaws opened and closed experimentally, the darting beasts lashed the air with fat, pointed tails.

  Chiun took a cautious step back from the familiar shapes.

  The creatures advancing on him appeared to be crocodiles. But appearance alone was deceiving. That these were not ordinary crocodiles was apparent to the Master of Sinanju. For one thing there were no life signs emanating from them. And though they made a good pantomime of living motion, their movements nonetheless were more jerky than the real thing. Their squat legs shot into the floor like fired pistons, propelling them forward. There was not the grace natural to all living things.

  Even as the animals crept toward him, Chiun demonstrated his contempt by tucking his hands inside his kimono sleeves.

  Rai
sing his wattled neck, he addressed the four walls.

  "Fools," he spit, his voice dripping scorn. "Your mechanized beasts are no match for Sinanju."

  His words brought an odd reaction from the crocs. All three animals stopped dead in their tracks. With agonizing slowness, the lead animal raised its head, looking up at him. Deep within its shiny dark eyes came a click and a whir. Chiun had no doubt that whoever was controlling the beasts was looking at him now.

  Artificial eyes trained square on Chiun, the crocodile's mechanical mouth opened wide. The old Korean saw that the rows of white teeth were sharper than any knife blade.

  Jaw locked open, the creature paused. For a moment Chiun thought that it might have broken down. But all at once a tinny sound issued from the black depths of its mouth, like a poorly reproduced recording of an old radio show.

  "Hello is all right," said the crocodile. And far back along its powerful jaws, its mouth curved up toward its eyes in a parody of a human smile.

  Standing above the beast, Chiun felt his very marrow freeze to solid ice. Hazel eyes opened wide in shock.

  And in that moment of stunned amazement, the crocodile darted forward, its machine jaws clamping shut around Chiun's exposed ankle with the force of a snapping bear trap.

  REMO GAVE UP trying to attack the walls. If he had more room to negotiate in the ever narrowing chamber, he might have been able to break through. As it was, the only dents he had succeeded in making had quickly healed themselves.

  The rear wall of the secret passage continued to slowly close in behind him. He was now only a few seconds from being crushed. But a few seconds was all he needed.

  Far down the corridor the red eye of the security camera continued to watch dispassionately.

  On the floor around Remo's feet were a few of the chunks of paneling that were left after he'd forced his way inside the chamber. With the toe of his loafer, he drew the longest one toward him.

  "First thing," Remo snarled. Leaning sideways, he scooped up the wooden fragments. "I don't like an audience."

  His hand snapped out. The chunk of wood whistled down to the far end of the narrowing corridor.

  The dart pierced the lens and the camera burst apart in a spray of white sparks.

  Behind him the compressing wall creaked as if in response. He felt it begin to move in faster.

  Remo released more breath, deflating his lungs. He'd have to work fast.

  Whoever had designed this place might not have been very creative. They had gotten Chiun with the floor and they intended to get Remo with the walls, but it was possible they had left one avenue open.

  Thrusting his hands straight up, Remo hopped off the floor, curling his fingers over the upper edge of the wall.

  The dust on the two-by-four framing was thick. Feet dangling in space, he began shifting his weight from hand to hand, rocking his body from side to side. As the walls continued to close in, he quickly picked up momentum, his feet swinging toward the ceiling. It was tough to work in such a confined space. Even so, his toe had just brushed the cheap pine when he heard a fresh noise in the passage.

  Somewhere distant, an intercom speaker clicked on. A tinny voice called out to him.

  "What are you doing?"

  It was thin and metallic. As he swung back and forth, Remo could not help but think he'd heard that voice before.

  "Given our past relationship I had an understandable desire to witness your demise," the faceless speaker continued, "but you have impaired my ability to see you. Perhaps you are already dead. Given the nature of the very creative trap in which I have ensnared you, there is a high probability that this is the case."

  Remo couldn't believe what he was hearing. It couldn't be. It wasn't possible.

  Yet given the circumstances it offered the best, if not the least troubling, explanation.

  "I will assume for now that you are not dead," suggested the voice. "I will continue to permit this passage to close in on itself, thereby insuring your demise."

  With that the speaker clicked off.

  As far as Remo was concerned, nothing more needed to be said. He had already heard enough. With a final wrench he flipped himself ceilingward, releasing his grip on the two-by-four.

  His body was propelled up from the passage and into the tight space between two parallel floor beams. His speed was such that the entire length of his body became a punishing force against the brittle wood. The pine cracked obediently.

  As dry kindling rained down inside the passage, Remo was already slipping up inside the dark crawl space. He burrowed through insulation and broke through underflooring, emerging-battered and dusty-in a third-story bedroom.

  When he glanced back down through the hole he'd made in the oak floor, he saw nothing but blackness. The walls had closed in, sealing the corridor.

  Another few seconds and he would have been dead. His thoughts flew to Chiun. The old man didn't know what they were truly facing. And with their opponent, a few short seconds was the difference between life and death.

  Hoping that his teacher had fully embraced the lesson of Master Shiko, Remo raced from the bedroom.

  THE CROCODILE HAD FIRED forward much faster than it should have. Chiun felt the rush of compressing air as the jaw snapped shut around his bony ankle.

  In the instant before it bit through flesh and bone, he jumped. His pipe-stem legs cut sharp angles in the musty cellar air. He landed in a flurry of robes, twirling to face the mechanical crocodiles.

  Bodies low to the ground, the animals were scurrying across the dirt floor after him.

  Understanding who his true foe was now, he kept his entire being alert as the animals advanced.

  "Your adopted son is dead," the lead crocodile said.

  Chiun paid no heed to the words or the mouth from which they emanated. He had no reason yet to believe them.

  As the lead crocodile and its companions crawled toward Chiun, the animal continued to speak.

  "He has temporarily impeded my ability to see his body, yet I have calculated a near one hundred percent probability that my stratagem to kill him has succeeded. I tell you this now, for I find that in times of emotional loss humans are more likely to make mistakes. An error by you now would give me the advantage, thus assuring your demise, as well."

  Chiun knew that the voice alone didn't necessarily mean that his enemy was here. While he could be hidden in one of the crocodiles, he was just as likely controlling them from some remote location.

  The crocodile lunged forward, its jaws snapping shut.

  Hopping over the savage champing mouth, Chiun's heel touched the back of the crocodile's head.

  It seemed like the gentlest of nudges, yet the animal's face rocketed down into the hard-packed dirt. There was a twist and groan of metal. When it rose back up, the crocodile's snout was bent straight up in the air at an impossible angle, obscuring its eyes.

  "I am curious to know if you are like other humans," the crocodile said around its twisted mouth. "Has the death of Remo, for whom you have an emotional attachment, made you more likely to make a fatal mistake?"

  The disconcerting smile stretched up the long mouth of the crocodile. As it did, the jaw creaked slowly back down, re-forming into its original shape. With a satisfied thrashing of its fat tail, the croc shot forward again.

  It nearly found its mark. Not because of its speed but because Chiun had become distracted by something else. Something at the far end of its whipping tail.

  At the last moment the aged Korean bounded from between the clamping jaws. He landed square on the beast's back.

  The crocodile twisted around after him. Even as it did so, the other two animals thrust their heads forward, all flashing jaws and razor teeth.

  Chiun ignored them all. Hopping through two more sets of clamping jaws, he negotiated a path straight down the lead animal's spine. At the far end of its whipping tail he found what he was looking for.

  A thick black cable ran out from the tail's nub. Snaking away ac
ross the floor, it vanished into the darkness of the pit from which the animals had come. Two more wires extended up into the room, connecting to the other crocs.

  As the lead crocodile contorted its body to snap at its unwanted passenger, the old Asian leaned down. With one long fingernail he snicked the cable in two.

  The animal immediately froze in place, its jaws open wide.

  The other two crocodiles were scampering toward him. Flipping around behind them, Chiun used flashing nails to sever their cables, too. The crocs stopped in midlunge, collapsing to the floor in twin coughs of soft dust.

  As soon as their umbilical connection was severed, the three cables that extended up out of the alcove began to thrash around the floor like fat black snakes. With desperate slaps they lashed the dirt in search of their severed ends.

  Before the cords had a chance to reconnect, Chiun kicked two of the huge animals to the far side of the room, out of reach of the grasping cables.

  He bent for the last crocodile. Swinging it by the tail, he brought it against the nearby wall.

  Crashing metal pulverized brick and mortar. The wall to the sealed-off room collapsed out into the main cellar.

  Tossing the broken shell of the big robot animal aside, the Master of Sinanju sprang through the hole. Thinking only of Remo's safety, he flew for the stairs.

  Chapter 24

  Stewart McQueen watched the action taking place inside his mansion from the safety of the tidy furnished loft apartment above his carriage house. As he studied the remote image on his TV screen, his lip was curled in nervous concentration, revealing sharp rodent's teeth.

  Mr. Gordons had suggested that the writer remain hidden in the remodeled carriage house while he dealt with his enemies in the main house. Something about his enemies being able to detect human life signs.

  At first McQueen wasn't sure he should believe the claims Gordons had made about the men who were after him, especially when he got a look at the pair who showed up at his front gates. But after watching them smash through his home, Stewart McQueen was starting to think he might not be safe even in this separate outbuilding.

  Gordons had hooked the security system into the TV, allowing McQueen to see everything. He watched the men enter, climb the stairs and break into the booby-trapped secret passage. When the old one was dumped down into the crocodile pit and the walls began to close in on the young one, McQueen was certain they were both as good as dead.