"He's okay," Walter assured Beta. "Really. He's an alien."
"He's one of the government guys who chased me from Las Cruces," Beta said, annoyed at Walter.
"Look at him," Walter insisted. "That's no Fed. The head, the eyes, the fingers. Even the robe screams 'alien.'"
Chiun had tucked his hands inside the sleeves of his kimono. He stared blankly at Beta RAM. Beta looked down at Chiun's wizened form. Flickering light from a dozen fires illuminated his kimono in an eerie glow. On closer inspection, though he hated to admit it, Beta realized the kid might have a point. Even so, he nudged his weapon closer to Chiun.
"If you're an alien, where's your ship?" Beta asked.
"Maybe he's from that UFO the electricity guy shot down," a Camp Earther suggested.
"Let him answer," Beta threatened.
Seeing their leader so concerned, some of the others had put their earlier enthusiasm in check.
They aimed their weapons at the Master of Sinanju, as well.
"I have parked my USO in the desert, so as to avoid the prying eyes of your government. See? I am well versed in your paranoid delusions. Now, to the matter at hand. Where is the one who was taken from the military base?"
Beta ignored the question, offering one of his own.
"USO?"
"Yes," Chiun intoned. "I am a great advocate of USOs."
"United Service Organizations?" Beta RAM asked.
"What?" Chiun said.
"That's what USO stands for," Beta explained. "You know, they're the ones who go around entertaining the troops during wartime."
"What are you babbling about?" Chiun asked. "I am not interested in troops. Only a single soldier. The one called Roote."
Some eyes strayed to Beta RAM. They knew that this was the name of the alien they were protecting.
"Roote is a soldier?" Walter asked. "Was he part of the intergalactic militia?"
Chiun did not hesitate an instant. "Yes," he replied. "I seek out this powerful and evil being in order that he might face trial beyond the stars." He waved an ominous hand skyward.
"What did he do?" asked a fascinated voice.
"He is a criminal."
There were shocked gasps. "Like Khan?" Walter asked, referring to the Star Trek character.
"Of course not," Chiun replied, thinking they were talking about Genghis Khan, a figure much beloved in Sinanju history. "I tell you this," he intoned, raising an instructive finger, "Khan was not only a great and much maligned ruler, but he always paid on time."
The Master of Sinanju would have gone on to further extol the virtues of the bloodthirsty Mongol leader, but he noticed all at once that the wonder-filled faces of a moment before had been replaced by expressions of cold mistrust.
"I told you," Beta barked to his followers. "He's no alien. He's with the government."
All of the weapons were up now. Twenty M-16s were aimed at Chiun's chest.
Remaining as deathly still as the mountain on which they all stood, the Master of Sinanju acknowledged not a single weapon. His hazel eyes were fixed on Beta RAM.
"What do we do with him?" Walter asked nervously.
Beta glanced back across the encampment, toward the lone hut where Arthur Ford's alien was hiding.
Beta turned back to the tiny figure standing before the flickering flames. He didn't hesitate in his response.
"Kill him," Beta said, his voice cold steel. And the night erupted in automatic-weapons fire.
"THEY'RE HERE!" Arthur Ford whispered hoarsely as he ducked inside the door of Roote's shack. The private was lounging against one wall. One index finger tapped idly against the top of a spent battery, sparking a single repetitive blue shock of electricity.
"Beta's friends?" he asked with a sick smile. Ford nodded desperately. Thinking better, he began shaking his head just as frantically.
"Not both of them. Just the old one."
At that moment, gunfire erupted across the camp.
Ford twisted, startled. He was so panicked, he almost dropped his rifle.
"They're coming!" he yelled.
"Calm down," Elizu Roote insisted.
Sighing, Roote glanced up at the corrugated roof of the shed. As the many guns rattled loudly outside, Roote seemed unconcerned. Staring at the ceiling, he continued to tap, bored, against the battery.
Roote's eyes strayed down the tin walls, skipping over to Arthur Ford's intent face. He smiled. "Well, if he's so eager to meet me, by all means, let's invite him into my parlor," Elizu Roote said with an evil grin.
TWENTY SECONDS before the Camp Earthers started shooting at Chiun, Remo was having his own problems.
He had circled around to a point just above Elizu Roote's shack. Arthur Ford had just ducked inside, and Remo was about to proceed down the hill when he felt the gun barrel in his ribs.
"Get up."
Two men. Perimeter guards.
He should have sensed them. At any other time since his earliest Sinanju training, he would have. But his body had yet to counter the residual effects of Roote's attack. In focusing his senses on the building below he had opened himself up to a nearer opponent.
Remo rose dutifully to his feet, arms raised. The shack was forgotten. He drew his senses back in tight, focusing on his immediate environment.
Just the two. No more loitering in the brush. They wore grubby flannel shirts and jeans. Scraggly beards sprouted from their grimy faces. "Is this the Devil's Tower landing strip?" Remo asked innocently. "I've got to catch a bus to Melmac."
It was at that moment that the gunfire erupted in the camp below.
The men twisted, startled. Looking down into the camp, they were just able to see a flash of silver near the fires. A tiny figure seemed to be dancing among their fellow Camp Earthers. Wherever it went, bodies seemed to fall.
As quickly as their interest in the distant battle was piqued, it evaporated.
Both men felt their guns being yanked from their grimy hands. They spun back to the man they had discovered lurking above the hut of their precious alien.
Remo was tossing the M-16s into the shadows. Soaring unseen, they flew over the side of the cliff, plummeting through the empty space to the Rio Grande far below.
"Hey, what'd you do with my gun?" one man complained.
"This," Remo replied.
Grabbing a handful of grubby shirt, Remo repeated the action he'd performed with the rifle. Screaming all the way, the Camp Earther arced out over the side of the mountain and plunged through the night air. The man's cry for help ended in a distant splash.
After witnessing the fate of his companion, the second man decided to take his chances on land. Without a word to Remo, he turned and flung himself over the edge of the hill, crashing down through rock and brush until he struck the plateau below. Once he hit, he did not move again.
"My life would be a heck of a lot easier if they all did that," Remo commented as he looked down at the body.
In the distant camp, guns still blazed. Chiun could take care of himself.
Senses straining alertness, Remo began picking his careful way down the hill to the shack.
CHIUN SWIRLED through the mob of Camp Earthers, an angry silver dervish.
Guns were wrenched from their owners, tearing arms from sockets in the process. Both rifles and appendages were flung aside.
"You dare!" Chiun raged.
Two Camp Earthers leaned against a pathetic tin shed, thinking that by bracing their backs they could get a steadier shot. But although they tried to track the movements of the tiny figure who flounced and spun within their midst, they failed to score a single hit.
Chiun suddenly whirled on the two men. Framed by campfire, he was like some demon cast up from the very bowels of hell itself.
Panicked, the pair unloaded everything in their magazines. It was not enough. As bullets sang out into the dark night, Chiun flew at the two men.
As he was airborne, nary a bullet kissed a single silk kimono thread.
Sandaled feet caught two brittle sternums, crushing them to splinters. The men exploded backward, crumpling the flimsy shed wall. Even as the dust began to collect on the thin film of blood that gurgled up between their dead lips, the roof of the shack was tumbling downward. It formed a makeshift coffin lid.
Chiun twirled from the collapsed corrugated tin.
The steady pop-pop of automatic-weapons fire had dwindled rapidly since its start mere moments before. The Master of Sinanju spun through the last four firing Camp Earthers.
Toes lashed out; hands were flung in seemingly wild gestures. Fingers clasping guns were shattered to jelly. Blood erupted from throats and chests. The gunmen fell to the dirt.
Chiun wheeled, narrowed eyes searching. He found Beta RAM cowering behind a pile of crates that the residents of Camp Earth had been breaking up for firewood.
Whirling over to the wooden boxes, Chiun brought his hands down in furious slashing movements. The wood shattered to kindling beneath his vengeful fists.
With one hand, Chiun lifted Beta into the air. "Where is the one called Roote?" the Master of Sinanju demanded hotly.
Beta extended a single, shaking hand. He was like a palsy victim. "There," he gasped, pointing to the far end of the encampment.
With a look of disgust on his wrinkled parchment features, Chiun flung Beta into the ruins of one of the Camp Earth shacks. Spinning on his heel, he marched from the scene of carnage, toward Roote's shack.
Even as Chiun was storming across the camp, Beta was pulling himself to his feet.
He didn't give Chiun's back a second glance. Heart thudding madly, Beta RAM ran as fast as he could in the opposite direction.
Chapter 28
Chiun's hooded eyes were knots of vellum mistrust as he watched the familiar figure running toward him.
Arthur Ford ran, stumbling, across the camp, away from the sand-covered promontory on which Elizu Roote's tin shack rested. Eyes wild, he flung himself desperately at the Master of Sinanju. Chiun grabbed the ufologist by the shoulders, holding him at an annoyed distance.
"You've got to save us!" Ford begged. "He's crazy!"
"You aided his escape," Chiun said levelly.
"That's because I didn't know what he was," Ford pleaded desperately. "You've got to believe me. He's dangerous. He has to be stopped."
Chiun released the UFO enthusiast. "This creature. It lurks within?" the old Korean asked.
Ford nodded. "He knows you're here, but he's weak. I don't think he has much power left." Eyes directed at the shack, the Master of Sinanju nodded crisply. He sensed both truth and deception coming from Ford. Without another word, he turned and crossed the small space to Roote's hut. Behind him a tiny smile broke out across Ford's face as Chiun ducked through the metal door. There was a moment of frightening silence.
All at once, a massive thumping noise erupted from the tin shed. And as Ford watched with nervous glee, the entire shack was engulfed in a pulse of electric blue.
HE WAS TOO SLOW!
Halfway up the hill, Remo watched in horror as the massive surge of electrical energy coursed around the exterior of the tiny metal hut. The hum that permeated the night air was that of a million insects' fluttering wings in one horrible instant.
Remo had only seen Chiun at the last moment. Too late to even shout a warning as the old Korean ducked inside the shed.
Now, as he watched the arcs of high voltage leap from one side of the frame to the other at the mouth of the shack, the dreadful truth could not be denied.
Roote was far more powerful than he had been during his encounter with Remo. There was no way Chiun could have survived such a massive burst of electricity.
It was Remo's fault.
This did Remo lament as he scurried the rest of the way down the hill, as he raced over to the shack.
His fault.
If he had been able to stop Roote the first time... If he had been able to convince Chiun of the seriousness of Roote's abilities...
If, if, if...
At the open door, he couldn't see through the blinding arcs of bluish electrical energy. It didn't matter. His senses already told him the awful truth. There were no life signs inside.
Chiun was dead.
All of the weakness he had been feeling since his original encounter with the killer drained away. Decades of exacting Sinanju training reasserted itself in one glorious, horrible instant. His heart rate quickened, then leveled.
A world of sensation exploded like a supernova out around the perfectly attuned body of Remo Williams.
Breathing the night air deeply, Remo broadened the focus of his senses to encompass the entire area around the bluff.
He found Roote.
The soldier was behind the shed. Directing his energy toward the rear wall. Frying whoever was hapless enough to step inside the deadly trap.
Remo channeled all of the swirling emotions he was feeling into a single, violent pit of white-hot rage.
Centering himself, he stepped around the side of the shack.
Elizu Roote was leaning casually against a boulder that jutted out of the outcropping of rock above the Rio Grande.
The killer seemed almost bored as he funneled streams of directed electrical energy into the rear of the shack.
A look of great surprise spread across Roote's pale features as Remo stepped around the building. The expression changed to one of satisfaction. He instantly cut the power flowing from his fingertips.
"Old geezer should be barbecued by now, what do you think?" he drawled happily. A smile creased his face.
"I think you're dead," Remo replied coldly. He walked slowly toward the killer.
"Now hold on there, fella," Roote said. "Ain't you forgetting somethin'? I whipped your ass last time."
As a reminder, he held up his hands. Sparks crackled between his metal-tipped fingers.
"You're nothing but a maniac crossbred with a microwave," Remo said. "I'm pulling your plug." The smile faded from Roote's face. He obviously didn't consider Remo a threat. He stood his ground as Remo strode ever closer to him.
"Are you working for Chesterfield?" the private demanded. "'Cause he's the real maniac. He knew what I was. But he went ahead and made me like this anyway."
"He's next."
Roote nodded. "Yep, I reckon he is. But I'll be the one gettin' him."
And with that, Roote lowered his hands. Optical targeting sensors locked on Remo's chest. All ten fingers combined their strength, launching a single explosive burst of electricity from Elizu Roote's gold fingertips.
But for the first time since his high-tech hardware was installed, something went wrong. He had a positive target lock, but for some reason, the target wasn't there.
The electrical surge passed harmlessly through the air, pounding into the rear of the shed. The tin roof rattled in angry protest.
Roote scanned the area quickly, looking for Remo once more. He found his target immediately- Remo was several feet to the left of where he had been. He was also much closer to Roote.
At the same time he was locating Remo, Roote's sensors registered another figure in the combat area.
He was coming around the far side of the shed. Racing in Remo's direction.
"Alien killer!" Arthur Ford screamed.
The ufologist was rushing at Remo from behind, brandishing one of the M-16 assault rifles.
When Remo glanced over his shoulder toward Ford, he presented Roote with a perfect target. He was a sitting duck.
The Army private raised his hands, locking on Remo. But at the moment he was about to fire, his autonomic preservation system suddenly kicked in.
Ocular scanners automatically fastened on Arthur Ford's raised gun.
It all happened in an instant.
The blue sparks leapt from Roote's fingers, gathering into a single burst of lightning, but Remo was already falling and rolling even before the bolt of energy popped from the killer's fingers.
The surge leapt over the back of Remo's T-s
hirt, soaring behind him, connecting with an audible thump with the barrel of Arthur Ford's M-16.
The shock flung Ford backward. He soared high in the air, crashing solidly into the rear of the shed. The metal buckled beneath the deadweight of his lifeless body. Both ufologist and gun dropped to the dirt.
Roote wheeled back to where Remo had been. He was no longer there.
To his horror, Remo suddenly reappeared, this time standing directly before Roote.
"Time to power down," Remo said flatly. Roote swung his hand around, trying to get a close-up shot at Remo. He found his arm blocked. And before he could fire again, he felt a sudden explosive pressure at the center of his chest. In the next instant he felt a push of warm air whistling past his ears, tugging him ever faster to the earth far below. The falling sensation was succeeded by a wet, engulfing blackness.
After that, Elizu Roote felt nothing at all.
ON THE LEDGE HIGH ABOVE, Remo Williams looked down at the limp body of Elizu Roote as it floated down the black strip of the Rio Grande. Desert stars twinkled brightly on the surface of the water.
Remo clenched and unclenched his hand. Something didn't feel right.
The crushing blow he had used against Roote's chest should have felt more solid. Instead, there had been an odd tingling sensation-almost as if the killing blow had failed to make complete contact. Obviously it had worked, however. Otherwise Roote would still be standing there.
Staring down at the limp body, Remo couldn't savor the victory. His success against Elizu Roote had come at a greater cost than he ever wished to pay.
He would have to collect the body of the Master of Sinanju. The old Korean would want to be buried in his native village, along with his ancestors. Although Remo tried to brace himself for what he would find inside the tiny shed, he knew that it would be impossible to do.
Heart heavy, Remo turned slowly back to the shack...
And nearly tripped over Chiun.
"Watch where you drop your fat white feet," the Master of Sinanju complained. He was observing the body as it washed slowly down the river. His face settled into lines of satisfaction as the current carried Elizu Roote around a bend and out of sight.
Remo no longer cared about Roote. He was staring in shock at the wizened form of the Master of Sinanju.
Killer Watts td-118 Page 21
