A Pound of Prevention td-121

by Warren Murphy

  There was no longer any hope for escape. These two were like no one he had ever met. He was left with but one option. If he was to die, they would go with him.

  Once he had disarmed the bomb, the digital counter shut down. Moving like an automaton, he reset it.

  The least amount of time the bomb's processor would accept was a minute. He set it for this. As soon as he did, the red LED counter winked down to 00:59:00. The tenths of seconds raced by in a blinding flash.

  While the last seconds of his life drained away before his eyes, Deferens woodenly feigned work. He shielded the counter with his body.

  "Smith will be relieved to find out Willie Mandobar wasn't behind this," Remo commented absently.

  "He will be more relieved that you did not allow this city to be destroyed," Chiun replied.

  "I guess so," Remo mused thoughtfully. "It was still tempting, though. Our work would have been done for at least a year or two while the bad guys regrouped."

  As he spoke, he reached into his pocket. Remo took out the stone-carved figure. He was studying the remarkably detailed image when he heard a gasp beside him.

  When he glanced over, Chiun's mouth had formed a shocked O.

  "Where did you get that?" the old man demanded.

  Remo glanced at the figure. "Oh, yeah," he said. "I forgot to show you. That little Korean ghost kid gave it to me. You want to see it?"

  When he tried handing it over to his teacher, the old Asian took a startled step back. He bumped into the still squatting Deferens, knocking the defense minister to the ground.

  For an instant, Remo pulled his eyes from his teacher's uncharacteristically bewildered expression.

  He saw the LED counter racing down to zero. "What the hell did you do?" Remo snapped. Deferens scampered back up, plastering his back to the face of the bomb. Sweat covered his pale forehead.

  "Nothing," he promised desperately.

  For Remo, the Master of Sinanju's strange behavior was instantly forgotten. Dropping the stone figure quickly back into his pocket, he shoved Deferens out of the way.

  There were only twenty-five seconds left. "Dammit, he screwed with this thing, Chiun," Remo said urgently.

  "You're too late!" Deferens barked triumphantly, his eyes burning hatred. "You're both dead!" He wheeled to Remo. "You are an idiot! I would have hired you both for twenty times what I paid you!"

  He shook visibly-terror, exhaustion and victory pummeling his rattled senses.

  Before Remo could take even a single step toward him, a new expression overcame his triumph. Deferens gasped in pain, clutching at his stomach where a red incision had abruptly slithered across his abdomen.

  Remo alone saw the flashing nail as it exited the wound. As Deferens's organs slipped through the yawning opening, Remo wheeled to the Master of Sinanju.

  The old man's hand was returning to his side. "Chiun, are you nuts?" Remo snapped.

  The display was down to ten seconds.

  The Korean's shocked expression upon seeing Remo's gift from the Master Who Never Was had steeled.

  "Move," Chiun commanded, sweeping past Remo.

  Crouching before the bomb, the Master of Sinanju's hands became a blur over the control pad. "This isn't your VCR," Remo warned.

  With only six seconds to go, Chiun shot his pupil a single glance. "You have yet to learn how to program that, too," he said thinly. Without turning back to the control pad, a single tapered index finger reached out and entered a final number.

  The countdown halted with three seconds left. The display panel on the side of the nuclear device winked to multiple zeroes and then slowly faded to black.

  Standing beside his teacher, Remo blinked amazement. "How did you do that?" he asked. "I have been paying attention all evening," the Master of Sinanju answered. He still seemed vaguely unnerved. His tone grew serious. "Someday, Remo, you will be required to use your eyes and I will not be here."

  Remo didn't have time to respond.

  On the floor, even as his grimy hands struggled to hold on to his dying organs, a waxy smile had formed on the perfect face of L. Vas Deferens. But when he saw the display grow dark, he began to slowly shake his head.

  "No," the minister panted weakly. A thin trickle of watery blood gurgled up between his model's lips.

  "Sorry, Elvis," Remo said with not a hint of sympathy. "Guess you're just shit out of luck." A toe kick sent the East African defense minister into the stagnant pool. Trailing organs, he hit with a splash.

  "What did that one say about paying you?" the Master of Sinanju asked as the sewer water accepted the gutted body.

  Remo shook his head. "We'll talk about it later. Right now we've still got an army of Luzus to meet, and if Batubizee's got one whiff of the dessert cart, he's probably already led the charge." Spinning from his teacher, he hurried down the platform.

  For an instant, a troubled flicker passed across Chiun's wrinkled face. As quickly as it came, he banished it.

  On steady, gliding feet, he raced to follow his pupil.

  Behind them both, the body of L. Vas Deferens bobbed on silent ripples in the water of the stagnant pool.

  Chapter 36

  Through a boozy haze, Nellie Mandobar watched Don Giovani approach. She staggered over to him, throwing a huge flabby arm around his shoulders. The Mafia leader shrank from both her touch and her alcohol-fueled breath.

  "And how are you enjoying our party?" Mrs. Mandobar belched. She lowered her voice to a stage whisper. "Partner," she added, giggling.

  His dark tan paled. Giovani strained to keep his horror from showing. "Keep your voice down, fool," he whispered. An unnatural smile that did not match his words was plastered across his weathered face. He tried to twist from her embrace, but her big arm was stuck fast to his shoulders.

  "No one hears us," she grinned. She waved to the stage where three of the Seasonings cavorted in Lycra and Spandex. Their massive pregnant bellies bounced to the beat. "They're too busy enjoying the last party anyone here will ever have. Everyone but us, that is." Winking broadly, the former first lady of East Africa took a slug from her omnipresent glass.

  "Shut up," Giovani snarled. He glanced around. "Have you seen Vincenzo?"

  Nellie was exchanging her empty glass for a foamy green concoction from a passing waiter's tray.

  "Hmm?" she asked, oblivious to the question. Don Giovani exhaled quiet disgust. He had thrown in with this woman, whose only motivation seemed to be revenge against her husband. The Mafia leader was stuck with her. For now.

  The old Italian glanced around, scanning for Don Vincenzo of Camorra. It was nearly 12:30 a.m., and the party was still going strong. Some men had disappeared a few times during the evening, always in the company of one of Nellie's hired whores or one of the Seasonings. They always returned, smiles plastered on their faces. From what Don Giovani had seen, the Seasonings seemed to be taking on more action than the professional prostitutes.

  As his sagging eyes searched the sea of faces in the huge meeting hall, he did not see his Camorra rival.

  "He had better be here," Don Giovani grumbled to Nellie. "I am leaving. If you do not wish to be incinerated in four hours, I suggest you sober up and do the same."

  Turning on his heel, the old man marched away. Alone again, Nellie Mandobar sipped her drink. Although she knew she was very drunk, she was still lucid enough to know that he was right. It was time to think about leaving. A shame. It was quite a good party. And she had certainly earned this time to celebrate.

  Willie Mandobar would be ruined. Short of hanging a gasoline-soaked tire around his scrawny neck, this was the best revenge she could hope for.

  Her plan had been timed to come to a head while her ex-husband was away. It was her own sympathizers in the Kmpali government who had requested his presence in China.

  The explosion here would prove that East Africa's claims of being a nuclear-free zone were a lie. The government of her husband's party would be discredited. And without his leadership as
president, the new East Africa would have to turn to another Mandobar to lead.

  Nellie Mandobar would succeed. And she would crush utterly the weakling man who had failed to stand by her at her time of greatest need.

  Nellie struck off around the edge of the crowd, sipping her drink as she walked.

  The band screeched on. Wails that passed for singing attacked the crowd from the speakers positioned at angles just below the bordering skylights. On stage, there were now only two Seasonings left. As she walked, Nellie thought she saw a pair of white go-go boots sticking up in the air behind a vibrating amplifier.

  Nellie returned a few smiles as she weaved her way out to the main hallway. The high glass doors of the grand foyer muffled the cacophony from inside. Mrs. Mandobar's ringing ears were just starting to relax when she became aware of a fresh sound.

  Pop-pop-pop.

  Listening to the muted noises, Nellie frowned. For a moment, she thought it was static from the sound system. But it seemed to be coming from outside.

  When she pushed open one of the thick front doors, she was instantly assaulted by the hot African night. Stepping onto the vast patio, she let the door swing shut behind her. The party sounds grew softer still.

  Taking a deep, cleansing breath, she searched the immediate area for the source of the popping sound. It came again. Louder now than before. A sharp slap that echoed out across the savannah. It was followed by another. Then another.

  Worry immediately knotted Nellie's ample belly. Gunshots.

  Even as this shock was registering, Nellie heard the screams. A moment later, men and women in various states of undress appeared, running up from the village.

  Trollop Seasoning-her pregnant belly bouncing to beat the band-led the pack of crime figures and whores.

  As she ran, she tugged at her sides. With a rip of spirit gum, her stomach prosthesis came free. Like her bandmates, she only wore it for media attention. The faux stomach was trampled beneath frantic stomping feet.

  "My God, they're attacking!" the pop singer screeched as the first of the crowd stampeded up the auditorium stairs.

  Mrs. Mandobar didn't need to ask who. When the first Luzu natives appeared down the road, Nellie's drink slipped from her pudgy hand. It shattered into splattering green fragments on the flagstone patio.

  Far away, the natives fell upon the stragglers, machetes slicing the night. Running bodies surrendered heads and arms.

  Trollop and the others pounded past the stunned Nellie Mandobar.

  "Girl domination, my ass!" Trollop was screeching as she clawed past a pair of hookers on her way through the door. "Get me men with big bulging biceps and guns! I mean-God, this is worse than that mall opening we did in Detroit!"

  As the men and women streamed inside, more gunshots rose from the village.

  Nellie finally got her bearings. Spinning from the rampaging Luzus, she raced back inside.

  It was coming apart. All her planning, all her dreams. But none of that mattered now. Suddenly safety was her overriding concern.

  When the door closed on her ample derriere, it was torn open a minute later by the first charging Luzu.

  The natives swarmed the building.

  And as the band stopped dead, their rehearsed shrieks supplanted by cries of pure terror, high on the roof the first of the helicopters coughed to life.

  Chapter 37

  Simple persuasion was all it took to convince one of Nellie Mandobar's pilots at the airport in Bachsburg to ferry Remo and Chiun to the site near the secret village. The man was still spitting out bloody tooth fragments as Remo and Chiun's helicopter rattled in over the area of savannah where they were to rendezvous with Batubizee's Luzu natives.

  An undercarriage searchlight revealed nothing but empty ancient road and mile after mile of barren savannah.

  "I thought you said they'd wait," Remo commented tightly as they swept over the treasury road. As he scanned the path, a spark of optimism lit the Master of Sinanju's youthful eyes. "We are late. Perhaps they have decided not to wait for fate to come to them."

  "Well, good for them and the Boston Braves," Remo griped. "Why couldn't they decide to carpe diem on their own damn time?"

  The Master of Sinanju gave a flickering nod of approval. "It is a start," he said.

  Remo directed the pilot to take them to Nellie Mandobar's village. They spotted the fleeing helicopters the instant their own chopper skirted the rough black hills.

  There were dozens of them, flying up out of the distant night, one after another. The helicopters raced out in every direction, desperate to put distance between themselves and the glass-and-stone auditorium that rose up like a glistening, illuminated diamond from the arid black earth. Remo and Chiun's pilot had to swoop and dive to avoid three midair collisions.

  The choppers clustered back together far out over the savannah. As they raced off in the direction of Bachsburg, more fleeing helicopters roared in behind them.

  When they arrived at the village, it was still far too dangerous to land on the busy plateau airfield. Remo instructed the pilot to set down on a dusty stretch between bungalows and hall.

  There had been sporadic flashes of light as they approached, indicating spotty gunfire. The shooting had dwindled to next to nothing by the time their helicopter touched ground.

  As soon as they landed, a dozen panicked guards swarmed the craft.

  Remo popped the rear door into the faces of two of the charging figures. With a crunching clang, the men collapsed to the dust. As the first guards fell, Remo and Chiun sprang out into the night.

  One guard tried to shoot Chiun, while another managed to get one leg aboard the helicopter. Chiun's flashing nails sought legs and hands. The gunman was left with two pumping wrist stumps while the other guard found himself pitching forward in the dirt onto his own severed legs.

  When Remo planted a single rifle barrel through two consecutive heads, the remaining guards seemed to get the lay of the land. The six men tore away from the helicopter they'd hoped to commandeer. They had no sooner vanished in the darkness behind the nearest bungalow before Remo and Chiun heard the swish of machete blades through air.

  Screams cut the night.

  "Guess there's no doubt who the party crashers are," Remo said aridly as he slammed the helicopter door closed.

  The instant he did so, the chopper lifted off. Flying fast, it joined the mass migration back to Bachsburg.

  At a full sprint, the two Masters of Sinanju raced for the huge auditorium, which sat in a blare of lights at the far end of the street. They met up with Chief Batubizee and Bubu on the sprawling flagstone patio.

  "And what part of 'wait' don't you understand?" Remo asked the young native after he and Chiun had vaulted up the front steps.

  "I am sorry, Master Remo," Bubu apologized.

  "I ordered this attack," Batubizee intoned. His massive sagging belly nearly obscured his loincloth. "Bubu has told me that it is Mandobar's woman who has brought East Africa to ruin and ordered you to kill me. I will have my revenge."

  At the chief's side, the Master of Sinanju nodded approval. "It is good at times for men to fight their own battles," he said. "At others, it is prudent to enlist aid. A worthy leader understands the difference."

  Batubizee's sweating face showed deep understanding. "You are truly a worthy successor to Nuk," he replied.

  Remo and Bubu stood together near the frosted doors. The fighting inside seemed to be dying down. "If we're through with the life lesson, can we please get inside before all the good heads are taken?" Remo asked.

  The Luzu chief and the Master of Sinanju exchanged a sharp nod. Hurrying across the patio, all four men ducked through the door and into the airconditioned hall.

  WHEN WORD of the Luzu attack first broke, most of the village guards had fallen back to the auditorium. It was during the skirmish there that many of the crime leaders had found the time needed to flee. Of the many dead around the hall, nearly all were guards.

  Remo
, Chiun and their two Luzu companions avoided pools of blood and severed limbs on their race across the big room.

  "You see Nellie anywhere?" Remo called over his shoulder.

  Batubizee and Bubu were scanning the area. It sounded as if the final skirmish was being fought somewhere near the kitchen.

  "She could be anywhere," Bubu said. "Perhaps she has already fled."

  The steady rumble of helicopters above their heads had nearly died. "Let's try the roof," Remo suggested.

  The stage near the open door was littered with bodies. While the band had been slaughtered where they sat, there was no sign of the Seasonings.

  The four men mounted the stairs to the roof. They broke out onto the helipad just as two of the last four helicopters were lifting off.

  A fat woman in a fruit hat and flowered burnoose was running desperately away from the spot where the two choppers had lifted off. She thundered over to one of the last two as it was preparing to take off.

  "Let me on!" Nellie Mandorar cried, grabbing at the door frame.

  A hand wielding a four-inch fluorescent limegreen clog appeared in the door.

  "Let go, fattie!" Ho Seasoning snarled as she smacked the former East African first lady's thick fingers. "There's a two-ton weight limit."

  For emphasis, she hurled her other shoe at Nellie. It struck Mrs. Mandobar square in the forehead. As the stunned woman staggered back, the helicopter took off. Regaining her senses, she ran for the last chopper.

  It was already rising from the platform by the time she arrived. Fat fingers grabbed for the skids. They missed.

  "I will have you necklaced!" Nellie Mandobar screamed furiously at the helicopter.

  Overloaded, the chopper dropped from sight beside the plateau. It appeared a moment later in the distance, struggling to pull into the air.

  "You are all dead!" Nellie screeched, waddling to the edge of the platform. Fat hands waved menacingly in the air. "I will burn you alive! Do you hear me! Listen to me!" She stomped a fleshy foot. Her fruit hat dropped over one eye. "Come back here this instant!"

  But no amount of jumping or screaming would bring the helicopter back. Continuing to fly low, it headed off across the savannah toward the city, rotor noise fading.