Killer Watts td-118

by Warren Murphy

  "Perhaps," Chiun said, unhappy to be swept along in Smith's speculative current.

  For his part, Remo seemed bolstered by the leap of faith the CURE director had taken on his behalf. "I'm surprised you're the one in my corner, Smitty," he said.

  "Your story is incredible," Smith admitted. "But there is much that is strange going on here. This entire base appears to be focusing its energy and resources on a single individual. That would make him special in the extreme. In a bizarre way, what you have said helps to explain a lot." He got to his feet. "I must meet with Chesterfield," he said determinedly.

  Remo stood, as well. Chiun was quick to rise to his side.

  "While you do that, I'm going to look for Roote," Remo announced.

  "That is ill-advised," the Master of Sinanju insisted.

  "You said Remo was well enough to complete his assignment," Smith challenged.

  "Yeah, Little Father," Remo agreed. "I'm healthy as a horse. Don't worry. I'll be fine."

  "Excellent," Smith said. "Now that you know Roote's abilities, you will not be taken by surprise. You two will have a better chance than anyone of stopping him. While you are gone, I will attempt to get to the bottom of this."

  Without another word, Smith stepped from the room.

  Once the CURE director was gone, Remo glanced at the Master of Sinanju. Chiun was staring intently at him, seeming to scrutinize his every facial feature.

  "What's wrong?" Remo asked with a sigh.

  The old man's voice was perfectly level. "I was attempting to determine who was the greater madman. You or Smith."

  "Oh," Remo said dully. "Care to pick a winner?"

  Chiun stroked his thread of a beard pensively. His intelligent hazel eyes were clouded in thought. "The jury has not yet rendered a verdict," he intoned.

  THE ROUGH ATV PATH they had taken through the desert spilled out onto a worn access mad that ran parallel to the chain-link fence marking the southern perimeter of Fort Joy.

  Signs warning intruders away had caused Arthur Ford concern for the past two miles. Although he had followed this route as a ufologist several times in the past without being bothered by the Army, he had never done so in the company of an extraterrestrial. He hoped the military hadn't put any special sensing equipment in place that would alert them to Roote's presence.

  More and more, Ford was thinking that the creature he was with might not be a benign alien. He had hoped for the kind of life-affirming fun in his encounter with a creature from another planet as was the norm in movies and television. But even Star Trek had its share of villains. Maybe Roote was like a Romulan or Cardassian. Or even like the Klingons used to be, and sometimes still were.

  These thoughts distracted him as they sped along the lonely desert road.

  "The rear gate's comin' up soon," Roote drawled. "Bring me over to the fence."

  They were driving at a slight angle on the uneven sand. The dusty earth spread up a short incline to a lone strip of sage-covered rock. The base fence had slipped behind this rise of land a moment before.

  Dutifully Ford stopped the jeep. He hurried around to the other side, helping Roote out.

  In spite of the desert heat, Roote's skin was clammy to the touch. All except his metal finger pads. These were warm as they clutched at the back of Ford's neck.

  Embracing Roote around the waist, Ford helped him climb up the steep side of the scrub-covered bluff.

  The first thing Ford saw when they crested the hill was not the fence, but the line of tanks and soldiers beyond.

  "Look out!" Ford screamed, pushing Roote to the rocky ground.

  He had thought to save his precious alien with his gallant act. But in truth, until Arthur Ford yelled, the soldiers hadn't even been looking their way. The men were farther along the fence, positioned closely to the desolate desert base entrance.

  The nearest soldiers instantly turned toward the intruders. A shout carried down the line, bringing the attention of the rest.

  Gunfire erupted instantly.

  The ground around them was pelted with a flurry of bullets. Some pinged off the chain-link fence, the sparks of ricochets flying crazily through the desert twilight.

  Arthur staggered and fell, accidentally dropping to safety behind a pile of black rock. A hail of bullets rattled against the hard rock, flinging flinty shards over the cowering UFO enthusiast's head. Bullets pelted sand, throwing puffs of powder into red-tinged sky.

  The sound was deafening. Ford screamed. His voice was buried in the thunderous roar of automatic-weapons fire.

  Covering his ears, flopping on his belly in the dust, he scrambled around on long legs, searching desperately for Roote.

  His starman was gone. Fear gripped Ford's chest.

  Roote had been beamed up. And not a bogus beaming, like with that G-man earlier in the day. This time, it had really happened. Elizu Roote had gone back to his mothership, abandoning Ford to the mercy of the U.S. military. Men who consistently-if the movies he saw were accurate-showed no mercy.

  Screaming turned to sobbing. Arthur Ford was weeping fat tears of terror into the bone-dry dust beneath his fearful face when he spotted a flicker of movement near the fence.

  He blinked back his burning tears.

  Feet kicking. Someone belly-crawling through the dust.

  Hope swelled instantly within Ford. It was the alien!

  He was protected by the far edge of the outcropping of rock. The men didn't appear to notice him. Not one bullet flew his way. The soldiers all seemed to be directing their fire at Ford.

  As it was dawning on Ford that his actions might actually have saved Elizu Roote after all, his alien was reaching a weak, shaking hand for the fence.

  He must not have seen the high-voltage signs posted along the electrified hurricane fence.

  Ford started to scream a warning ...too late! As he watched in helpless horror, Roote clamped down firmly on a cluster of chain links near the desert floor.

  And then things got strange.

  Over the waning gunfire, Arthur Ford distinctly heard the hum. Felt it. It filled the air all around him. It was the sound of a large factory whose many machines inexplicably powered down at the same time.

  The hair on Ford's arms and neck tingled.

  The soldiers stopped firing. They must have heard and felt it, too. Confused shouts issued from beyond the fence.

  Even as the men were trying to figure out what was happening, Roote was rising swiftly from the scrub brush.

  He held on firmly to the fence with one hand, jutting the fingers of his other through the chain link. The hum turned into a whining crescendo, and before another bullet sang from the other side of the fence, Roote fired.

  The raw power surge was staggering.

  It hit the nearest tank. The armor plating crackled as a million crisscrossing blue sparks raced along the vehicle's length. The blue glow was a brilliant contrast to the bloodred sky.

  The electrical surge hopped from one tank to the next, to the next, enveloping the entire row in a matter of seconds. In between, it leapt to gun barrels, bouncing crazily down the line of men like some insane arcade game come to life.

  Every metal surface grabbed hold of the charge, sizzling, blasting the electricity down into the ground.

  Men were thrown back, arms fried. They screamed in agony as they fell. Still Roote fired. Shells within tanks detonated, blasting out huge jagged chunks of hot shrapnel. In a matter of seconds, the entire defensive line was turned into a glowing, moaning killing field. More than three hundred men lay dead or critically wounded. Victory mattered not to Elizu Roote. Energy channeled from the fence continued to pour through him out over the field long after any danger had passed. The electricity flowed from the hand that gripped the chain link over to the other even as his cybernetic microchips were siphoning precious power into his capacitors, restoring them to full operating levels.

  Farther down the hill, behind Roote, Arthur Ford watched all of this with sick horror.
/>   Roote was like a man possessed. He killed blindly. Horribly.

  The thrill of meeting an alien vanished in a flash. In that moment, Ford's fear got the better of him. He threw himself backward, tumbling end over end down to the access road at the base of the rocky incline. He landed, bloodied and bruised, on the hard-packed sand.

  His jeep was forgotten. Flight was all that mattered.

  Staggering, limping, Ford flung himself out into the desert. As he ran, the horrible crackle of electricity was carried to him by the warm breeze. And intermingled with the crackles was Elizu Roote's crazed laugh of triumph.

  Chapter 12

  Ten minutes after Remo had scrounged a jeep from the Fort Joy motor pool, he and the Master of Sinanju were following the dusty path that skirted the artillery range.

  Smith had caught Remo on his way out of the barracks area, telling him that Chesterfield had reported two Apache helicopters had been downed in the desert south of their position half an hour before. According to reports the CURE director had overheard, a major battle had also just taken place at the southern gate.

  Remo's face was stern as they drove into the growing darkness. He wasn't right. He knew it. In Sinanju, breathing was all. Remo had had this drilled into him forever, to the point where it was beyond second nature. But now there seemed to be something more.

  Roote's attack had sent his system spiraling away from the perfection of mind and body that was the most ancient of all martial arts. It wasn't his breathing that was off; it was his heart. The muscle had taken a pounding and now seemed unable to correct itself. And a single imperfection in a Sinanju-trained body was like a ripple on a pond, it eventually reached all shores.

  For anyone else on earth, a recovery like Remo's would be a miracle worth celebrating. But for Remo it was intensely frustrating. And in his line of work, anything short of perfection wouldn't cut it.

  Since regaining consciousness in the Fort Joy infirmary, Remo had been thinking about the story of Master Cung. He was a Sinanju master who fell victim to a sickness of breathing. Rather than fight his illness, Cung surrendered to it. It took the death of his pupil and a Japanese invasion of the village of Sinanju for Cung to realize that the weakness was a thing to be overcome, not revel in. His lesson-proper breathing is all, but proper attitude is everything.

  If the story was true, Cung had banished his physical problem in an instant. But for Remo, that didn't seem possible. And his inability to master so simple a thing in his own body frightened him.

  As they drove along the slithering rutted road, Chiun glanced furtively several times at his pupil. Eventually, Remo could take it no more.

  "I'm fine," he insisted, feeling the pressure of his teacher's gaze for the tenth time in as many minutes. Frustration mingled with annoyance.

  "I was watching the sunset," Chiun replied nonchalantly.

  "It doesn't set in my ear," Remo pointed out.

  "No," Chiun admitted. "That would imply that light enters your skull at least part of the day. As far as I have ever been able to tell, that melon atop your shoulders is cast in perpetual gloom. There was a time I considered growing mushrooms in it."

  "Har-de-har-har," Remo said. "Considering what we're up against, maybe you should ditch the chipper mood."

  "Yes. The human lightning bug," Chiun sighed. Thoughts weighty, he stared out at the desert. "If only I had presence of mind to bring a canning jar from Castle Sinanju. We could have captured the dastard and placed him on the mantle in triumph."

  "Listen to me, Little Father," Remo insisted harshly. "I'm serious. I want you to be careful." The earnestness in his tone was what touched Chiun. Remo truly believed what he was saying. And in that belief was a genuine concern for the well-being of the Master of Sinanju. It was moving. It would have been more so, had it not been for Remo's obvious decline into madness.

  Chiun turned to his pupil. "Would it make you feel better, Remo, if I said I believed you?" he asked, a sad smile on his parchment face.

  "Only if you meant it," Remo said. "This guy is really dangerous, Chiun. I don't want you getting caught off guard like I did. Whether you believe me or not, just promise me you'll be careful."

  Chiun nodded thoughtfully. It wouldn't hurt to humor his mad pupil. "I will take care," the Master of Sinanju said gently.

  Remo didn't seem entirely satisfied. It was clear Chiun was just paying lip service to him. Having the Master of Sinanju to worry about on top of everything else would make his next meeting with Elizu Roote all the more difficult. But if push came to shove, Remo wouldn't allow the demented soldier to harm his teacher. Even if it meant protecting Chiun with his own life.

  Each lost in private, disturbing thoughts, neither man spoke as they sped on into the encroaching night.

  THE MEDICAL CORPSMEN screamed orders as they ran from one charred body to the next.

  Enlistees hauled the dead into a special cordoned area near the fence, lest precious time be wasted rechecking those who were beyond help.

  Soldiers still alive were carted with little care onto stretchers. There wasn't time to worry about their comfort. Just keeping them alive was top priority.

  The worst were loaded onto waiting helicopters. The rest were packed on shelflike racks in the backs of waiting ambulances.

  Army choppers crisscrossed the gray-to-black sky, glaring searchlights illuminating wild patches of blowing scrub and frantic human activity. Sirens blaring, Army trucks adorned with crosses of red tore back toward the main base. The scene was one of utter chaos when Remo and Chiun arrived. They parked next to the row of twenty tanks.

  The desert was already growing cool as they stepped down from their borrowed jeep. They avoided the hustling stretcher-bearers and approached the last tank in line.

  Large sections of the tank turret had been blown away in the internal explosion. The main cannon had been ripped partially off and now lay against the nose of the crippled vehicle. Even so, most of what was below the deck structure remained intact. This was the area on which Remo focused his attention. He didn't need to search long.

  "It was him," Remo announced instantly.

  He pointed to a spot above the big tank treads to a blackened area a foot in diameter. The armor plating within this zone had partially melted to slag. It had dripped down the side of the tank, solidifying once more in slender droplets behind the tread.

  "That's not consistent with an explosion," Remo said with certainty. "Something hit this thing from the outside."

  Chiun frowned as he studied the odd marks in the metal. They matched nothing known to him.

  Even so, the Master of Sinanju remained silent as Remo led him around the rear of the tank. They found a similar melted area on the opposite side. "It came out here." Remo pointed.

  They stepped over to the next armored vehicle. "It must have hopped the space between and slammed right into here," he said excitedly, pointing at yet a third melted section of armor. The surrounding area was scorched, as well. "Now do you believe me?"

  "It is odd," Chiun admitted.

  "Damn right it's freaking odd," Remo said. The two of them went around to the front of the tanks.

  There were bodies everywhere. Hands were burned to shades of black and bloody purple. Blisters had erupted on the faces of some. Groans and sobs rose up in pathetic chorus from the remorseless desert sand.

  Remo's features could have been carved from granite as he surveyed the scene of carnage. He looked down at one soldier propped up against a tank. The man's flesh was smeared black. One arm was thrown across his face as he rolled in slow agony in the dust.

  With an effort, Remo tore his eyes away from the grisly sight.

  They used the side of the first tank to judge the angle from which the initial blast of electricity had come. When they reached the hurricane fence, Chiun was first to see the strange marks in the links.

  "There," the Master of Sinanju said, pointing. Remo looked to where the fence was buckled outward very slightly in the direct
ion of the desert. There were five black marks in the metal, consistent with the pads Remo had seen on Roote's fingertips. They were about five feet off the ground. Another set of similar marks was visible much closer to the ground.

  "It's electrified," Remo said.

  They had both sensed the thrill of power from the fence. To Remo, the sensation was an unpleasant reminder of his encounter with Roote. His nearness to the fence seemed to make his heart fibrillate. It was as if his body expected bolts of electricity to come leaping for him once more. He banished the uncomfortable feeling.

  "He must be able to channel it somehow," he said.

  The frown Chiun had been wearing throughout their investigation grew deeper. The old Korean looked back toward the field of carnage.

  Flashing red ambulance lights and streaks of helicopter searchlights illuminated the macabre tableau. Someone had finally come to attend to the soldier they had seen on their way to the fence. A stretcher was brought forward.

  "I will concede that it is possible," Chiun said finally. He almost sounded as if he meant it.

  Remo didn't allow his relief to be too great. After all, they still had much work ahead of them. "There are footprints outside the fence," Remo said. With a nod he indicated the scuffmarks in the sand where Roote had obviously stood. "We'd better see where they lead before anyone else gets killed."

  Turning, they hurried back to retrieve their jeep. Driving past the battlefield, they headed through the gate and out onto the desert path.

  They found the abandoned jeep a moment later. "Dollars to doughnuts it's his," Remo said. He looked up the rocky incline beside the parked jeep. Although darkness had fallen, Remo's eyes were able to pull in enough ambient light to see almost as well as if it were full daylight. He spotted the crushed sage and tumbled stones instantly.

  Chiun saw it, too. "Someone has fallen down this hill recently," the Master of Sinanju said from his seat next to Remo.

  Remo glanced across the path.

  "There," he said, pointing. "He ran into the desert."