“Yes,” said Rex.
The voice was a woman’s but a strange woman’s voice, ice–cold and iron–hard, with no regional inflection, with not even the touch of the old South that was popular in most parts of California among women who spent their worktime talking on the telephone.
“I am calling for Ms. Reidel. The set to which you are to take your visitor is ready now. You may take him there now. It is the set in back of the main building in the far corner of the lot. Do not tarry. Take him now.”
Click. The caller hung up before Rad Rex could speak. The actor grinned sheepishly at Chiun. “That’s one of the things I hate about being in a new town. People herd you about like an animal.”
“True,” said Chiun. “Therefore one must never go to a new town. One must be at home everywhere.”
“How to do that would be a secret worth knowing.”
“It is simple,” said Chiun. “It comes from inside. When one knows what he is inside, then everyplace he goes is his place and he belongs there. And thus no town is new because no town belongs to someone else. All towns belong to him. He is not controlled. He controls. It is the same with your little dance.”
“Dance?” said Rad Rex.
“Yes. The karate hopping that so many of you people do.”
“Greatest killing technique ever devised.”
“From my son I could not stand such an incorrect statement,” said Chiun. “But from you, because you are unskilled and know no better…” He shrugged.
“You saw what I did with that pool cue,” Rex said.
Chiun nodded and rose slowly, his black–and–red robe seeming to rise with a will of its own.
“Yes. Karate is not all bad. It teaches you to focus your pressure on just one point, and that is good. Karate is a rifle shot instead of a shotgun. For that it is good.”
“Then what’s bad about it?”
“What is bad about it,” said Chiun, “is that it does nothing but direct your strength. Nothing but focus your energy. So it is an exercise. An art is creative. An art creates energy where none existed before.”
“And what is an art? Kung fu?”
Chiun laughed.
“Atemi-waza?”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
IT WAS A SLEEPY FRONTIER SALOON. Several bottles of rotgut whiskey stood on the bar. Four round tables with chairs around them were poised, empty, as if awaiting the arrival of men after the spring roundup. Swinging doors led, not to the street, but to a large photograph of a street that was posted on a board outside the swinging door.
“Why am I here?” asked Chiun.
“I was told to bring you here,” said Rad Rex.
“I do not even like Westerns,” said Chiun.
“I don’t know why you’re here. I was told to bring you here.”
“By whom?”
“By one of Wanda’s assistants, one of those nameless, faceless zombies she’s got working for her.”
“Would you say mechanical?” asked Chiun.
“You bet,” said Rad Rex and then was propelled toward the door of the empty set by Chiun.
“Quick,” said Chiun, “you must go.”
“But why? Why should… ”
“Go,” said Chiun. “It may not go well for you here and I would not deprive the world of the genius of As the Planet Revolves.”
Rad Rex looked at Chiun again, then shrugged and walked out into the bright sunlight of the Global Studios lot. So the old man was a little nuts. Who wouldn’t be from watching soap operas all day long?
Inside, on the set, Chiun pulled a chair away from a table and sat on it lightly.
“You may come out now, tin man,” he called aloud. “You gain nothing by waiting.”
There was silence, then the swinging doors at the entrance to the saloon opened wide and in walked Mr. Gordons. He wore a black cowboy outfit and a black hat. Silver-studded black boots adorned his feet, matched by the silver-studded black hat he wore. He had on two guns, white-handled revolvers slung low at his side.
“Here I am, gook,” he said, looking at Chiun.
Chiun rose slowly to his feet. “You are going to shoot me?” he said.
“Reckon so,” said Gordons. “Part of my new strategy. Separate you from the one called Remo and pick you off one at a time.”
“You put such faith in your guns?”
“Fastest draw in the world,” said Gordons.
“How very much like you,” said Chiun. “A being made of junk relying upon junk to do a man’s work.”
“Smile when you say that, pardner,” said Gordons, “Do you like my new way of speaking? It is very authentic.”
“It could not help but be an improvement,” said Chiun.
“Reach for your guns, mister,” said Gordons.
“I have no guns,” said Chiun.
“That’s your tough luck, old timer,” said Gordons, and with hands that moved in a blur, he flashed two guns from their holsters and fired at Chiun, who stood still across nine feet of floor, facing him.
· · ·
The cab let Remo off in front of the driveway to Global Studios, and the first thing Remo saw was guard Joe Gallagher in the watch booth. The second thing he saw was a golf cart, used by messengers for deliveries on the lot, parked next to a car at the curb while a young messenger placed something into the trunk of the parked car.
Remo hopped aboard the golf cart, stepped on the gas, and it lurched forward past Gallagher’s watch booth.
“Hi,” Remo called, driving by.
“Hey, you, stop. Whatcha doing?” yelled Gallagher.
“You see my ball?” Remo called. “I’m playing a Titleist Four.” And he was past Gallagher and onto the lot. But where was Chiun?
Up ahead Remo saw a familiar face and drove up to the man who was walking along, slowly shaking his head.
Remo pulled up in front of him and said, “Where’s Chiun? The old Oriental?”
“Who wants to know?” said Rad Rex.
“Mister, you’ve got one more chance. Where’s Chiun?”
Rad Rex rocked back on his heels and raised his hands in front of his chest. “Better not fool with me, buddy. I know Sinanju.”
Remo took the front of the golf cart in both hands, twisted and ripped out a piece of the fiberglass the size of a dinner plate and tossed it to Rex.
“Is it anything like this?” he said.
Rex looked at the heavy slab of fiberglass, then pointed over his shoulder to the closed door of the sound set. “He’s in there.”
Remo drove off. Behind him Rad Rex followed him with his eyes. It looked like everybody knew Sinanju except Rad Rex. He did not think he liked being in a town of martial arts freaks. He was going back to New York, and if Wanda didn’t like it, screw her. Hire somebody to screw her.
Inside the building, Remo heard shots. He jumped off the still-moving golf cart, opened the door and raced inside.
As he moved through the door, Mr. Gordons wheeled and fired at the movement.
“Duck, Remo,” called Chiun, and Remo hit the floor, rolling, spinning toward a large crate on the floor. Two bullets hit the door behind him.
Remo heard Gordons’ voice. “You will be next, Remo. After I have disposed of the old man.”
“He’s still kind of talky, isn’t he, Chiun?” Remo called.
“Talky and inept,” said Chiun.
Remo peered over the top of the wooden crate, just in time to see Gordons fire two more shots at Chiun. The old man seemed to stand still, and Remo wanted to shout to Chiun to move, to duck, to dodge.
But the old man seemed only to twist his body slightly and Remo could see the sudden thuds of the fabric of his robe as the bullets hit it, and Chiun called: “How many bullets, Remo, have those guns?”
“Six each,” Remo yelled back.
“Let’s see,” said Chiun. “He has fired nine shots at me and two at you. That is eleven and leaves him one more.”
“He fired three at me,” Remo said. “He
’s out of ammunition.”
“Eleven,” Chiun called.
“Twelve,” yelled Remo. He stood up and again, Gordons wheeled and squeezed the trigger at Remo.
Bang! The gun fired but Remo moved on the flash of light, before the sound, and the bullet hit the wooden box, gouging out a large slash from it.
“That’s twelve now,” said Remo.
“Then I will destroy you with my hands,” Gordon said. He dropped both guns on the floor and advanced slowly toward Chiun, who backed off and began circling, away from Gordons and away from Remo, opening Gordons’ back for Remo.
Remo moved forward, between the box and the wall, toward the old Western saloon set.
His hand brushed something as he moved, and he looked down and saw a fire extinguisher on the floor. He grabbed it up in his right hand, and came forward.
Chiun had continued circling and now was almost over Gordons’ guns. In one smooth movement, he scooped up both revolvers.
“They are expended, gook,” Gordons said. He circled, keeping his eyes on Chiun, and Remo moved up behind him until he was only five feet away.
“No weapon is useless to the master of Sinanju,” said Chiun. He twirled both guns in the air above his hand, seemed ready to unloose the gun from his left hand, then let fly the gun from his right hand.
It buried itself deep in Gordon’s stomach, but there was no sparking, even though the force of the projectile had penetrated the hard wall of the abdominal cavity.
“His circuit controls are somewhere else, Chiun,” said Remo.
“Thank you for telling me what I have just learned,” said Chiun.
“It will do you no good,” said Gordons. He moved a step closer to Chiun. “This is your end, old man. You will not evade me as you evade my bullets.”
“And you can’t evade me,” said Remo. He turned the fire extinguisher upside down. There was a faint chemical hiss. Gordons spun toward Remo, just as Remo squeezed the handle and a heavy white foam spritzed out of the extinguisher and swallowed up Gordon’s face. As he turned, Chiun unleashed the second gun, firing it, like a deadly frisbee, end-over-end into the heel of Gordons’ right foot.
There was an immediate sparking. Gordons’ hands reached up to claw the foam from his eyes, even as Remo fired more at him.
And as he watched, Gordons’ hand movements grew slower and slower and his heel continued to spark against the revolver embedded deep in it and then Gordons said:
“You can not escape me,” but each word came out slower than the word before it until “me” sounded like “mmmeeeeeeeee,” and the android dropped onto the floor at Remo’s feet.
“Bingo,” said Remo. He continued spraying Gordons until the whole body was covered in a mound of thick white chemical foam, then he tossed the empty fire extinguisher into the corner behind him.
Chiun stepped forward and touched Gordons’ prone body with a toe. There was no reflex movement.
“How’d you know the circuits were in his heel?” asked Remo.
Chiun shrugged. “The head was too obvious. Last time it was the stomach. This time, I decided, the foot. Particularly since I had seen him limp at the hospital.”
“This time, we get rid of him,” said Remo who looked around until he found a fire axe on the wall and began chopping into the mound of foam, sending splatters ceilingward, feeling like an axe murderer as he dissected Mr. Gordons into a dozen pieces.
“Hold,” said Chiun. “It is enough.”
“I want to make sure it’s dead,” said Remo.
“It is dead,” said Chiun. “Even machines die.”
“Speaking of machines,” said Remo. “We’ve got to get Smith loose.”
“It will be nothing,” said Chiun.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHIUN FREED SMITH BY long-distance telephone from the Sportsmen’s Lodge.
On the way back to the lodge, he had Remo stop in a drugstore and buy a simple bathroom scale.
In their room, he directed Remo to call Smith.
“Tell the emperor to have a scale brought into his room,” Chiun directed. He waited while Remo transmitted the message and then waited some more while Smith got on a scale.
“Now tell him to find his weight,” said Chiun.
“One hundred forty-seven pounds,” Remo said to Chiun.
“Now tell him to put ten pounds of weight into each pocket of his kimono and to walk from the room,” said Chiun.
Remo passed along the message.
“Are you sure this will work?” asked Smith.
“Of course it will work,” said Remo. “Chiun hasn’t lost an emperor yet.”
“I’ll call you back if it works,” said Smith and hung up.
Remo waited by the phone as seconds turned to minutes.
“Why doesn’t he call?” he asked.
“Do something productive,” said Chiun. “Weigh yourself.”
“Why? Is this room mined too?”
“Put your feet upon the scale,” ordered Chiun. Remo weighed one hundred fifty-five.
The needle had barely stopped jiggling when the telephone rang.
“Yeah,” said Remo.
“It worked,” said Smith. “I’m out. But now what? We can’t leave the room mined.”
“Chiun, he wants to know now what,” said Remo.
Chiun looked out the window at the small trout stream.
“Have him prepare weights of one hundred forty-seven pounds for him, one hundred fifty-five pounds for you, and ninety-nine pounds for me,” said Chiun. “He should put these weights on rollers, roll them all into the room, and stand back from the force of the boom boom.”
“He’ll do it after he gets bomb experts there,” Remo told Chiun after passing along the message.
“How he does it is of no concern to me,” said Chiun. “I do not bother myself with details.”
The next morning, Smith called to announce that the plan had worked. The room had exploded, but that section of the hospital had been evacuated and with heavy explosion-resistant mesh and padding, Smith’s experts had been able to contain the blast with little damage and no injuries.
“Thank Chiun for me,” said Smith.
Remo looked at the back of Chiun, who was watching his daytime soap operas. “As soon as I get a chance,” he said.
Later that day, he told Chiun of Smith’s success.
“Of course,” said Chiun.
“How did you know it was mined to explode by our weights?” asked Remo.
“I asked myself how you would set such a boom boom. I answered myself, Remo would do it with weights. What other way, then, would another uncreative creature do it?”
“That’s your final word on the subject?” asked Remo.
“That word is sufficient,” said Chiun.
“Go scratch,” said Remo.
When they left Hollywood the next day, Remo managed to drive his car into a long line of limousines cruising slowly along with their headlights turned on in broad daylight.
He pulled out of the line, up alongside a car, and called to the driver: “What’s going on?”
“Wanda Reidel’s funeral,” the man called back.
Remo nodded. In the rearview mirror, he saw the limousines stretched out behind him for almost a mile.
“Big crowd,” he called to the driver.
“Sure is,” the driver called back.
“Just proves what they always say,” said Remo.
“What’s that?”
“Give the people something they want to see and they’ll come.”
About the Authors
WARREN MURPHY was born in Jersey City, where he worked in journalism and politics until launching the Destroyer series with Richard Sapir in 1971. A screenwriter (Lethal Weapon II, The Eiger Sanction) as well as a novelist, Murphy’s work has won a dozen national awards, including multiple Edgars and Shamuses. He has lectured at many colleges and universities, and is currently offering writing lessons at his website, warrenmurphy.com. A
Korean War veteran, some of Murphy’s hobbies include golf, mathematics, opera, and investing. He has served on the board of the Mystery Writers of America, and has been a member of the Screenwriters Guild, the Private Eye Writers of America, the International Association of Crime Writers, and the American Crime Writers League. He has five children: Deirdre, Megan, Brian, Ardath, and Devin.
RICHARD BEN SAPIR was a New York native who worked as an editor and in public relations before creating The Destroyer series with Warren Murphy. Before his untimely death in 1987, Sapir had also penned a number of thriller and historical mainstream novels, best known of which were The Far Arena, Quest, and The Body, the last of which was made into a film. The book review section of the New York Times called him “a brilliant professional.”
Also by Warren Murphy
The Destroyer Series (#1-25)
Created, The Destroyer
Death Check
Chinese Puzzle
Mafia Fix
Dr. Quake
Death Therapy
Union Bust
Summit Chase
Murder Shield
Terror Squad
Kill or Cure
Slave Safari
Acid Rock
Judgment Day
Murder Ward
Oil Slick
Last War Dance
Funny Money
Holy Terror
Assassin’s Playoff
Deadly Seeds
Brain Drain
Child’s Play
King’s Curse
Sweet Dreams
The Destroyer Series (#26-50)
In Enemy Hands
The Last Temple
Ships of Death
The Final Death
Mugger Blood
The Head Men
Killer Chromosomes
Voodoo Die
Chained Reaction
Last Call
Power Play
Bottom Line
Bay City Blast
Missing Link
Dangerous Games
Firing Line
Timber Line
Midnight Man
Balance of Power
Spoils of War
Brain Drain Page 13