The mountain seemed to shiver.
Behind his goggles, the pilot blinked his eyes. When he looked back, Hermon was stationary once more, as if nothing had happened. But something had-
Perhaps it was a problem with his goggles. Or perhaps there was fog on the interior of his cockpit dome. At this height and in this climate, ice should not have formed on the exterior of the craft, but that was a possibility. It might have even been an earthquake. Whatever had happened, there had to be some explanation.
The pilot thought to report the strange phenomenon once he landed. He would never get the chance. All at once, a stiff breeze blew in out of the west, engulfing his aircraft.
The nose of the MiG seemed to wobble. Just as Mount Hermon had.
The wind passed.
Another bizarre occurrence to report. The pilot adjusted the stick slightly. It failed to move.
Concerned, he tugged harder. Nothing. It was locked in place.
Checking the other systems, he found to his horror that they were all the same. Frozen solid.
The MiG began to lose altitude.
Looking over, the pilot saw that his sister craft was in the same predicament. Nose dipping forward, it had begun an inexorable screaming dive for the lowland mountains.
No way to pull out of the dive. Controls frozen.
Nothing more he could do. The plane was going down.
The pilot hit the eject switch. Nothing happened.
He hit it again. Still nothing.
Ground racing up now. Faster, faster.
Pounding the switch. Banging hands against the dome above his head.
Nothing moved. Everything fused.
Ground visible on the other side of the dome. In front of the nose.
Too fast ...too fast...
The two MiGs impacted against the rolling base of Mount Hernion twenty seconds later. Twin explosions of yellow and orange gouted a spray of metal and stone.
And though the crashes and ensuing fires were fierce, through it all Mount Hermon stood. Unchanged.
THE SCENE PLAYED OUT the same way from Cyprus to Saudi Arabia, from Egypt to the west of Iran. Afterward, some claimed they had felt something. All said they saw something. A strange shimmering of the land, followed by a warm wind.
Guns seized up at a rally in Lebanon. King Abduilah's plane nearly crashed during takeoff in Jordan. Elevators, automobiles, kitchen appliances, construction equipment-indeed all metal-on-metal hardware within at least a seven-hundred-mile radius around Israel's disputed West Bank-became inoperative. As if clenched in a powerful, invisible fist. And around the world, stunned governments nearly tripped over one another as they sprang to sudden action. All of them with the same goal: to gain a foothold in the suddenly powerless region.
Chapter 29
Their car suddenly seized up on the road into Hebron.
Behind the wheel, Bryce Babcock desperately turned the key, at the same time pressing his foot on the gas.
Nothing happened. Not an engine struggling sound, not a feeble click. Nothing.
"The peace bomb," Babcock exhaled, nodding anxiously.
Nossur Aruch leaned over the front seat. "Give it more gas," he instructed angrily.
"I already did."
"You flooded the engine," the PIO leader accused.
"How could I?" Babcock whined. "We were driving fine. It just stopped. It must be the neutrino wave."
Aruch growled, dropping back in his seat. "Now what am I supposed to do? I cannot walk back to my office. They will slaughter me in the street."
"What about this stuff?" Babcock suggested. He lifted a few articles of clothing that had been left on the seat by Fatang and the other bodyguard. Aruch's facial stubble gathered into a prickly frown. Reluctantly grabbing the clothes, the PIO head improvised a disguise.
Aruch abandoned his beloved checkered family kaffiyeh for a more traditional, less cumbersome head wrapping. A pair of dark sunglasses obscured his crazed, unblinking eyes. That was it. On another man, two minor changes like these wouldn't have mattered, but on Nossur Aruch they managed to obliterate his two most distinctive features.
"I shame my ancestors to dress like this," Nossur Aruch complained as he stuffed his beloved head covering inside his wrinkled fatigue jacket.
Disguise in place, he grabbed the door handle. The door refused to budge.
"What is this devilry?" Aruch demanded, furiously rattling the handle.
"The neutrino wave would have fused virtually all metal on metal," Babcock grunted from the front seat. He, too, was attempting to open his door. It was stuck fast.
The shatterproof windows refused to power down. "So how do we get out?" Aruch snapped.
It took twenty more minutes and the removal of the back seat. On their backs, both men were able to kick open the sedan's trunk. Sweating profusely, they climbed out the back and onto the rock-strewn street.
"What's that noise?" Bryce Babcock panted when they were safely outside the car. His khaki shirt was drenched.
Aruch tipped his head. "It sounds like a mob," he replied, puzzled. "But if it is, it is not like any I have ever heard before."
The two men headed off into the city, threading their careful way to Aruch's Hebron office.
They had not gone far before they found the source of the noise.
Aruch had been right. It was a mob-and it was also unlike any he had seen in his lifetime.
"They are not using guns," Aruch breathed to the interior secretary, his voice a hoarse lisp.
"They wouldn't work, either," Babcock explained. "Metal on metal, remember?"
The crowd had formed a semicircle around a short, garbage-strewn alley. The center of attention, an emaciated old man stood at the far end of the lane.
Men had gathered up chunks of crumbling buildings and roads. Laughing and shouting, they hurled the rocks at the cowering, bleeding old man.
"He has a gun," Aruch hissed, indicating a man who had just joined the crowd.
The man aimed his weapon. Aruch watched in interest.
As soon as the new arrival depressed the trigger, there was an explosion. However, it didn't come from the barrel.
The gun blew up in the man's hands, ripping them to shreds. Screaming in pain, he fell to his knees. The crowd didn't notice. Their stone throwing had reached a fever pitch. The pathetic old man surrendered to the jagged rocks without so much as a sigh. He died in a bloody heap at the rear of the alley.
Aruch turned to Babcock. When he peeked over his sunglasses, there was sad understanding in his eyes.
"No guns?" he asked, disappointed.
"I told you," Babcock replied nervously.
"But this was to be the Great Holy War," Aruch complained. "The Jews have lost their teeth. Detonating that bomb was a symbol for my people to rise up for a free Palestine. How can we have a proper jihad without arms?"
"Please, Nossur," Bryce Babcock begged. He was thinking of all the peace bomb was supposed to have done. It was supposed to be a shining example to the rest of the world. Not a prelude to chaos. "It wasn't supposed to be this way. This was supposed to be for the good. Like when I set those leopards loose in Pennsylvania. If you'd only surrender to the loving embrace of peace, all will be well." His attempt at a benevolent smile made him look constipated.
Aruch's expression fouled to disgust.
"Peace is for those who have not the stomach for war," the PIO leader proclaimed. He raised a stubby, threatening finger to the interior secretary. "And for your sake my beloved missile had better work," he menaced.
Whirling from Babcock, he hurried from the mob, heading deeper into the city. Casting a last, frightened look at the bloodied dead man, Bryce Babcock hustled in Aruch's wake.
Chapter 30
The desert storm screamed off into the arid hills where it had been born, and was gone.
Remo had concentrated on weightlessness during his time hurled through the air and so was featherlight when he finally landed softly on his sto
mach, a quarter of a mile back from the spot where the forward rush of air from the neutrino bomb had caught his truck.
The wind had not yet died away before he sprang up. Unharmed, his worried eyes scanned for the Master of Sinanju. He found him immediately. The old Korean was up and padding across the desert toward him, his face a stony frown.
"Your driving skills are appalling," Chiun accused as he approached. "If you wish me dead so that you may assume Reigning Masterhood, please tell me. I would rather send myself home to the sea than participate in any more of your one-man demolition derbies."
"Don't start on my driving again," Remo warned, masking his intense relief. "Even you can't possibly blame me for that."
At Remo's side now, Chiun puffed out his chest. "Perhaps," he admitted. "Nevertheless, you are crashing carriages with alarming frequency of late. When we return home, I am enrolling you in a driver's-education program."
As before, Remo detected a light undertone-very faint. He now suspected he knew why.
"Look who's talking," he replied. "Ted Kennedy laughs at your driving."
He looked back to the point they both knew to be ground zero.
The mushroom cloud was dissipating into thin smears of puffy lines above the hills. Even the wind was dying down.
"I guess we were far enough away to avoid the radiation," Remo commented.
"It is in the air," Chiun pointed out.
"Not bad," Remo said. "The sun on a weak ozone day."
"Nonetheless, we should leave this area." Remo nodded.
They walked a half mile down the road when they came upon what was left of their truck.
The roof was crushed as if beneath a dinosaur's foot. The bed was twisted to a right angle from the cab. One axle had snapped. Half of it-along with the attached tire-was missing altogether.
"I guess we don't really need it anymore anyway," Remo commented. "It's pretty obvious we won't be bringing the neutrino bomb back with us."
"What of the emperor-in-exile?" Chiun asked.
"Yeah, the President," Remo said, exhaling. "He was going after Aruch. If we're lucky, we'll find both of them together. Assuming we can scrape up transportation."
"Ye of little faith," Chiun replied, eyebrow arched. He nodded down the road.
When Remo turned, he saw that a group of men on camelback was riding in from the north. They had seen the cloud and survived the terrifying gust of wind and were now coming to investigate the cause of the strange phenomenon.
When Remo turned back to Chiun, he was shaking his head.
"I am not riding one of those things," he said emphatically.
"We haven't a choice," Chiun insisted.
"They could probably give Ronaldman's wig lice lessons," Remo groused. "And I thought thanks to Master Na-Kup that you didn't like Mountain Monsters or Hill Humps or whatever the hell the Sinanju scrolls call camels."
"Hush," Chiun admonished. "I am about to negotiate with bedouins-the most crafty and avaricious hagglers in the world-and I do not need your constantly flapping lips as a distraction."
"Yeah? Well, I hope you have a plan," Remo muttered.
"Of course I do," Chiun sniffed.
The old Korean waited patiently for the men to arrive. Remo stood beside him, tapping his foot on the road.
There were nine of them, all dressed in traditional robes and kaffiyehs. They slowed their beasts near the pair of strange pedestrians.
Faces dark as a desert night, their suspicious eyes peered out over sand-coated veils.
"Greetings!" the Master of Sinanju called up to the Arabs. "My son and I require two of these fine animals. Remo, pay the nice men."
"Some plan," Remo griped. Grunting, he dug in his pocket, removing a wad of bills.
Apparently, the bedouins didn't have a problem with American currency. Remo peeled off several hundred dollars, handing the bills to the eager men.
Two camels were separated from the rest. The Master of Sinanju scampered quickly onto the hump of the larger beast.
"Try not to crash this, Lead-Footed One," Chiun announced to Remo. With a twist of the reins and a kick of his heels, the camel began to trot down the road.
"I'll crash you," Remo grumbled. Grabbing a fistful of fur, he pulled himself up onto the hump. Grinding his heels into the animal's sides, he sent his camel after that of the Master of Sinanju.
Chapter 31
Though the media liked to think he had slept straight through his eight years in office-save, of course, the single time he managed to pad, yawning, down to the Oval Office to approve a secret arms deal to a fundamentalist Islamic nation-the former President of the United States had been as attentive as his post would allow. As luck would have it, he remembered from White House briefings that the main office of the Palestine Independence Organization was in Hebron. Problem was, it was miles away across hostile terrain.
A stolen robe and headdress had gained him anonymity after his harrowing escape from his PIO captors in Lebanon. The features that peeked out around his veil had not brought unwanted attention. His dark tan and weathered skin were common enough for men in this part of the world.
A stolen jeep and dumb luck helped him slip across the border from Lebanon into Israel. His biggest problem came once he was inside the Jewish State.
His jeep ran out of gas. Carrying his disguise in a lumpy bundle beneath one arm, he was forced to continue on foot. He hadn't gone far before he was spotted by a border patrol.
Fortunately, in another lifetime, the President had been a bit of a thespian. His acting skills had come in handy when he was being questioned by the soldier.
The former President claimed to be an American tourist who was visiting Israel with his wife. He said he had become separated from the rest of his bus tour.
The soldier was very young. So young, he failed to recognize the old man standing before him. After admonishing the tourist for his carelessness, the soldier drove him back to within a few miles of the disputed West Bank where the President claimed his tour bus was scheduled to arrive any minute. After the soldier had gone, the President donned his Arab disguise once more and headed into the West Bank.
As he made his way through the busy streets, the former President caught a few curious glances from passersby.
In his robe, with head and face covered, he was dressed rather formally for the disputed zone. Most Arabs in the area were comfortable wearing a simple open shirt and slacks. However, in spite of the interest some might have had, they left the President alone.
Aruch's office...Aruch's office...
He wasn't quite sure where to go. For some reason, he seemed to think it was on the south side of Hebron.
The buildings were all at least three stories tall and set directly on the roads. They lent a feeling of intense claustrophobia to the narrow streets.
The President pushed himself forward. He felt the strain of labor burning in his lungs. His heart pounded. Muscles ached from effort.
He was exhausted. Ten years before, this would have been a grueling test of endurance. But at his age and after all he had recently been through, it was nearly too much for him.
It was a struggle to move on.
But he had to. Nossur Aruch had the neutrino bomb. The PIO leader had to be stopped.
As he trudged on, puffing ragged breaths through his sweat-and-saliva-soaked veil, the President thought ruefully how much easier it would have been for him fifteen years ago.
Back then, all he would have had to do was pick up the red phone in the White House. Smith would have answered, and within minutes his men would be deployed. Aruch, Babcock and the neutrino bomb all would have been stopped.
But he could not live in the past.
Smith's men were doubtless looking for him. The President himself had seen to that. But they might not know where he had ended up. They could still be wandering around the California hospital. No, the President was here, now. The only man who knew what was going on. The only man who could make a dif
ference in time.
Panting, trying to run. More a hobble. A rumble in the distance. Thunder?
The buildings around him seemed to shimmer. For a moment, it looked as if they might flicker away altogether, fading into the desert, joining the dust of countless civilizations that had squatted for a brief time beneath the same heartless sun, only to be absorbed by the sand.
Wind followed. Strong, but not fierce. Kicking up great clouds of dust in the narrow passageway between the tightly lined buildings.
The dust began to settle moments later. Even before it had, the President knew he was too late. Tiny battered cars stopped dead on the street around him. Their drivers could not get them to start again.
Shouts from buildings. Confusion. Fear. Panic.
The anarchy would come quickly. He was too late. There was nothing more he could do here. The President turned, hurrying back the way he had come. He would get back to Israel. To safety. Aruch hadn't brought the bomb to Hebron. The wind had been to the President's back. He had planted it somewhere closer to the border with Lebanon.
After forty-five minutes of running back and forth in this squalid city, he was growing dizzy from his exertions. The frustration of failure piled atop the strain of effort.
An old man. He never should have tried. Never should have taken the risk.
Even as he thought the words, he knew they were wrong. They were foreign to him. Not what he expected from himself.
He had tried. He had failed, but he had tried. Sweating profusely. The chaos in the streets growing around him with each tortured step. Gangs grabbing strangers. Fearful shouts. Sudden bursts of anger. Somewhere nearby was a cheering mob.
His heart pounded. Mind swirled. Couldn't breathe. Too much effort.
Have to stop. Have to rest. If only for a minute. He paused against the side of a building at a quiet intersection. Panting, he leaned against the hard wall. A wrinkled hand pulled the veil from his face only for a moment.
Fresh air. He breathed deeply a few times.
The air was like sandpaper on his raw throat. Still, it felt good. Refreshing. Bracing.
Keep moving.
He pushed away from the wall, reaching to replace his veil as he did so.
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