"Hail Artemis," said the guard.
"Oh, will you shut up?"
"Hail Artemis," said the guard.
"Drop dead, Corporal," Artemis raged.
Immediately the soldier put his hands around his own throat and squeezed until the color in his face changed from white to red to purple to blue. When his eyes were bulging and his tongue lolled darkly out of his mouth, the soldier collapsed in front of Artemis.
Samantha screamed. "What the hell did he do that for?" Artemis asked.
"You told him to drop dead, didn't you?"
"I asked him to shut up first."
"But you ordered him to drop dead. These men only respond to direct orders," Randy explained.
Artemis whistled low. "Because they love me," he said.
"It's not exactly you. Lehammet, bring me another foot soldier." The swarthy lieutenant rambled off without acknowledgement. In a few minutes he returned with a private in uniform.
Artemis checked his watch. "It's almost four a.m.," he said. "Aren't these men supposed to be asleep?"
"They sleep when we tell them to." Randy turned to the young soldier. "Private, eat dirt."
The soldier dropped to his knees and began stuffing handfuls of earth into his mouth. "Go on, tell him to do something."
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Samantha giggled. "Can I really?"
Randy nodded. "Okay," Samantha said with a shrug. "Drop your pants."
The private obeyed. "Jesus Christ," Artemis said. "What've you done to them?"
"You and Samantha helped," Randy said cheerfully. "You got them to set aside their own personalities for the good of the idea. All great speakers have that power. And since I wrote your speeches, their ideal was my ideal—Vadassar. Of course, Sa-mantha's stone pony cocktails helped get the men's minds in a receptive state."
"It was nothing," Samantha said modestly. "Just apple juice laced with PCP and a little acid. I used to mix it up for parties back in junior high. One drink and your brains turn into scrambled eggs. A real blast."
"The men loved it, darling," Randy said. "After you held your communions, the men were so highly suggestible that all you had to do to turn them to violence was to bring in a victim and turn the men loose. They were like a pack of mad dogs at that stage."
"Why'd you pick chaplains to be the victims?"
Randy laughed. "Because they're the only ones who would come alone and unarmed, idiot. We didn't want the men to fail on their first kill. If they did, they might never have had the confidence to exterminate the officers at their bases today and come here."
She turned to the blank-faced soldier standing at attention in his shorts. "Go back to your barracks, private," Randy said. The private padded back where he had come from, his trousers draped around his ankles.
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"He didn't even pull up his pants," Artemis noticed.
"That's because we didn't tell him to."
"Do you mean that these soldiers only do what they're told—by whoever tells them?"
The oily- looking lieutenant grinned. "That is correct, Artemis Thwill. You are not the only one who commands them now. We no longer need you."
"That's enough, Lieutenant," Randy snapped. The officer sniggered contemptuously at her command, but remained silent.
"Unfortunately, the process isn't complete yet," Randy explained. "The drugs and the first kill sent the men into a state of utter confusion. But in all four test bases, that stage ended quickly, within a couple of days. Then the men turned into automatons, like the private who was just here. At the mo-. ment, they'll take commands from anyone."
"I guess that could be dangerous," Artemis said. "In combat, all the enemy would have to do would be to order them to stop."
"Exactly. But we're training them now to respond only to us. They'll be perfect in a few days."
"Who's 'us'?" Artemis asked.
"Never mind. Go inside and get ready. You're addressing the troops in ten minutes. I've got your speech right here, so just get into your clothes." She pushed the couple into the door, closing it behind them, and kicked the corpse of the corporal who had strangled himself on Artemis's command. "Get this carcass out of here," she told the lieutenant.
"I am not one of your zombies," the lieutenant
said scornfully. "I am of the true army of Vadassar,
and I accept orders only from General Elalhassein."
"And General Elalhassein accepts orders from
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me," she said coldly. "Now drag this body into those bushes if you want to see another sunrise."
Grudgingly, the lieutenant complied. With the corporal's remains concealed, he stomped out of the bushes. "It is done," he said sullenly.
"Show me where you put him," Randy insisted.
With a sigh of disgust, Lieutenant Lehammet led her to the spot, gesturing to the dead soldier with a courtly bow. "Are you satisfied?" he asked.
"Not quite." She reached into her purse, pulled out a.3 8 Smith and Wesson, and fired two shots directly into the lieutenant's brain. As his body slumped lifelessly over that of the corporal, Randy Nooner said, "Now I'm satisfied."
The huge stadium, built to accommodate 100,000 people, was only partially filled with the current population of Fort Vadassar, but the recruits present gave Artemis a full measure of divine respect. Six thousand recruits greeted him with salutes as he stumbled onto the podium, then fell to their knees in holy worship. "Hail Artemis," they rumbled.
Artemis covered the microphone and turned to Randy and Samantha, who were standing behind him. "I'm used to playing to a full house," he said.
Randy sighed. "It'll be full tomorrow, and every day after that. "Just read the speech, okay?"
He cleared his throat and unfolded the speech Randy Nooner had written for him.
"Artemis is greatly pleased with his welcome at Fort Vadassar, by the vanguard of the new army," he began.
The recruits cheered.
Artemis squinted. The thought crossed his mind
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that he would soon require reading glasses. And he really should have looked over the speech before delivering it. God didn't trip over his messages to the flock, after all.
"I am come to bless your great endeavor," he read quickly, trying to sound spontaneous, "for . . ." He halted as he read the following words silently. A lone voice in the crowd filled the short silence by shouting, "Hail Artemis."
". . . For I will not be among you much longer?" he asked Randy Nooner, forgetting to cover the mike. A roar of outraged disbelief rose from the stadium. "What is this bullshit?"
"Go on, read," Randy whispered, shoving him back toward the podium.
"My mortal life is nearing its end?" he continued, still questioning the contents of his strange.speech.
Screams of "No!" and "O divinity" rang out above the rumble of the troops.
"Even as I stand before you, a—what?—a government plot has been put in motion to halt my words forever. . . . Aw, come on, Nooner," he said, slapping his hand on the lectern in disgust, but his words were obliterated by the rising hysteria of the worshippers, who had just been informed that they were losing their messiah.
"Hold it," Artemis yelled, waving his arms to try to quiet the crowd. "Big mistake. Keep your pants on, everybody."
But even as he spoke, a long-nailed hand holding a hyprodermic syringe moved swiftly toward Arte-mis's spine, and in a moment he lay in a heap on the podium while 6,000 soldiers wailed as though the world had ended.
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Seven
It was 4:50 a.m. when Jay Miller stepped into the spacious entranceway to the United States Senate building in Washington, D.C. His heart was pumping overtime, as it had since the telephone call an hour before, requesting his presence at a special breakfast meeting.
His two years in Washington had taught him not to question the summons from above. If Senator Os-good Nooner felt like having breakfast at 5:00 a.m. with the
Assistant to the Chief Clerk of Records, then, by golly, Jay Miller was not about to turn down the invitation. He felt a small rush of power as he flashed his identification card to the guard inside the portals, knowing that the name Jay Miller was on the guard's list of persons who were to be allowed admittance at that hour.
"Yes, sir," the guard had said as he handed Miller a special pass.
Sir. At 26, he'd never been called "sir" in his life. He wound his way around the hallowed labyrinthine corridors, showing his special pass proudly, until he reached the office of Senator Osgood Nooner. It was guarded by a six-foot Marine who examined his
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pass and escorted him to the senator's inner sanctum before returning to his post.
The senator was sitting at his desk, writing. Jay Miller stood in the doorway for several seconds, afraid to enter. Finally, he cleared his throat in announcement.
The senator looked up. "Ah, come in," Senator Nooner said, smiling broadly. Miller took a couple of halting steps forward as the senator rose and strode briskly toward him. "Glad you could make it, son. Hungry?"
Miller gulped. "No, sir. I mean, yes, sir."
"No need to be nervous, son," the senator said, patting Miller on the back. "We're all just ordinary people, living together in the crazy world for better or worse, right? Here, have a seat."
Miller attempted a smile as he sat down at the small table set for two with gleaming silver chafing dishes and a single red rose.
"Hope it's not too early for you, ah—"
"Miller, sir. Joshua Miller. My friends call me
Jay."
The senator spooned a portion of scrambled eggs onto Miller's plate. "Jay it is, then," he said. "I'd like you to consider me your friend. Call me Ozzie."
"Yes sir, Ozzie, sir," Miller said, choking on his
first bite.
The senator sat back and waited for his guest's coughing fit to subside before speaking again. "Now, Jay, you may be wondering why I invited x you here. Go on, eat."
Miller obeyed, stuffing more eggs into his still-sputtering mouth.
"The fact is,. Jay, I want to ask you for a favor."
"Me?" A crumb of scrambled egg flew from Mil-
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ler's lips, hitting the senator square iri the eye. The young man leaped up immediately, knocking over an orange juice glass and causing the table to shake precariously.
"Sit.down, damn it," the senator roared, holding the sides of the table to steady it. With his napkin, he removed the offending particle, then threw the napkin onto the table with a loud slap. "Cretinous fool," he muttered before composing his face into a mask of cordiality. "That is, everything all right, Jay?"
Miller nodded. His teeth were chattering.
"What I called you in to discuss is a matter of extreme national importance, Jay, so I'd like your word that what passes between us will go no further."
"Oh, you have my absolute word on that, Ozzie, sir."
"Good. Til get right to the point, Jay. It's the army records."
Jay Miller felt his palms begin to sweat. He was in charge of filing the records for the army in the Pentagon. "Is something wrong, sir?"
"Ozzie," the senator corrected, smiling. "Yes. Something is definitely wrong." He gave Jay's trembling hand a fatherly squeeze. "Don't worry, son. It's not your fault. The red tepe in the Pentagon is—well, you know how it is." The senator chuckled and exchanged with Miller a between-us-insiders smile. "The point is, there's a whole army base in Texas thafs been operating since 1979 that there aren't any records for. No construction payment records, no files on operating expenses, no personnel records, salary documentation, nothing." He laughed jovially. "Now, isn't that something?"
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Jay Miller blanched. "But—but that can't be," he stammered. "If it's been operating since 1979, then surely—"
"There are no records," Senator Nooner said slowly, enunciating every word so that the idiot sitting across from him would be sure to understand.
"No, sir. There are no records," agreed Jay Miller.
"You're a smart boy, son. I think someone as bright as you is a real asset to our country. I think that a person with your brains ought to have a better job than Assistant to the Chief Clerk of Records. Don't you, Jay?"
"I—I don't know, sir."
"Call me Ozzie."
"I guess I'd like another job, sir—Ozzie. I never really thought about it."
"A job such as, say, Secretary of the Treasury?"
"Abba—abbaba," said Jay Miller.
"I'm a powerful man, son. I could arrange it."
"Abbaba—baba—"
"Excellent. I'll set the wheels in motion today. Of course, you'll have to straighten out the army files before you leave. Create new dossiers on Fort Va-dassar—that's the new base—transfer the personnel files, details like that."
"Sure," Miller said, his face flushed with anticipation. "Once I get the okay, I think I can have everything in order in six weeks, Ozzie."
"You have the okay, as of now. And you've got one hour."
"One hour? But I don't even have the information to file."
Nooner smiled grandly. "That's a detail Tve already taken care of, son. They don't call me the
85
People's Senator for nothing." He handed Miller a stack öf official forms and a lengthy list of names. "Just put these in the Vadassar file bank, and transfer the personnel dossiers for the soldiers on the list from whatever camp they're in—mistakenly—to the Vadassar files. That clear?"
The young man took the papers uncertainly. "I guess so. But one hour—"
"Secretary of the Treasury," Nooner said.
"One hour it is, Ozzie,"
"Good. Come back when you're through." Nooner rose to shake the young man's hand and waited for the door to close behind Jay Miller before picking up the telephone. He dialed the number of the Washington Post.
"This is Senator Osgood Nooner," he said. "I've just received some shocking news from an extremely reliable source about the massacres at the army bases yesterday. The word is that the Pentagon itself is responsible. The leadership at one base, Fort Vadassar, knows the story and is sufficiently outraged by its moral implications to inform the press about it in an open conference at twelve noon today."
He repeated the message, along with directions to Fort Vadassar, to the New York Times, the New York Daily News, the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the Dallas Herald, ABC, CBS, and NBC. It took him just under one hour. Then he lit a cigar and waited for the return of Jay Miller, the man who thought an assistant clerk of records could become Secretary of the Treasury by rearranging a few files.
The young man returned exactly on time, his smile indicating he had completed the job.
"Very fine work, son," Nooner said, opening the
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desk drawer where he kept some personal effects. "Did anyone in the Pentagon's file offices try to stop you?"
"Oh, no, Ozzie," the young man said. "No one was even there at this hour, and the guards all know I run those files." He flushed with pride. "I really appreciate this opportunity, sir. I never thought I'd get a chance to work with Senator Osgood Nooner."
"I always like to give a smart fellow like you a helping hand, son," the senator said as he slipped a handkerchief over the barrel of the new, unloaded .45 automatic in the desk drawer and tossed it toward the young man. Before Miller could recognize what the flying object was, he reached out and caught it. And at the precise moment when Miller began smearing his fingerprints over the empty weapon, Senator Osgood Nooner tucked the handkerchief into his coat pocket and screamed, "Help! There's a killer in here!"
Within seconds the Marine guard stationed outside Nooner's door was in the office, his weapon drawn.
"Shoot! " Nooner yelled.
Jay Miller looked, bewildered, from the gun in his hand to the senator who had promised him a cabinet position only an hour before. And he understood, during the infinitesimal
moment between the time when the guard's pistol fired and the searing, burning pain in his back obliterated every working part of his organism, that Senator Osgood "Ozzie" Nooner had spoken the truth. ¦
There was indeed a killer present.
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Eight
Remo vaulted the wire fence surrounding Fort Bor-goyne, then waited while Chiun ripped the links apart and stepped through the opening. They walked to the center of the camp and slipped unnoticed into a group of new recruits stepping off the arrival bus at the parade grounds.
Remo remembered the frightened recruits of his early army days, but this was a totally different kind of crew, obviously used to standing in lines, apparently in prison mess halls, and to milling around aimlessly, presumably while employed in federal job programs.
"This is your army?" Chiun said.
"It's supposed to be."
"God, save the Republic," Chiun said. "Where is the marching? Where are the banners? The cymbals?"
"This is the American army," Remo said. "Most of these guys will have to reenlist to have enough time to tell left foot from right foot."
He looked with Chiun toward an onrushing sergeant whose face suggested that his father had been a bull terrier.
"I am Sergeant Hayes, and this is the United
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States Army," the sergeant boomed. "You came here to work, and work you will. Do all your orders read Fort Borgoyne?"
Only a few voices squeaked an answer. "Yes." The other enlistees seemingly did not care what their orders read, just so long as it was not Sing Sing.
"Yes what?" the sergeant yelled at the top of his lungs, although he stood no more than two feet from the ragged line of recruits.
"Yes, sir," a few answered in unison.
"What?"
"Yes, sir," they thundered.
"Again."
"Yes, sM"
Chiun was clapping his hands together in rhythm ñ and smiling delightedly. "Yes, sir," he squealed, marching in his own little circle. "Yes, sir! This is the real army. Yes, sir."
He turned excitedly to Remo. "You were right," he said, his long robes billowing as he stomped in single formation. "One two," Chiun called out. "Hup, tup, Wing Ho."
"Wing Ho?"
"It is an advanced drill used in the Chinese Third Dynasty. No one talks about it now, but the Chinese could never fight as well as a field of butterflies. Still, their marching was unparalleled. Kwo Hun Wing Ho."
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