"Ouch, that hurt," Cooder said uneasily. The twin blades vibrated so much the phenomenon was visible even from their distant vantage point.
Then the blades unlocked, stood apart momentarily, and came at one another with renewed fury. The pane of glass broke before their eyes, so great was the shock wave that rippled from the clashing blades.
"They're not supposed to move!" Don Cooder blurted. "They're monuments."
"Well, they're moving now,", said Reverend Juniper Jackman, licking his scraggly mustache in worriment. His pop eyes seemed to stick out further than usual. He had the furtive look of a compulsive arsonist who, upon awakening from a bender, smelled gasoline on his fingertips and couldn't recall how it got there.
Don Cooder drew in his breath. "What could be causing this? What incredible power, unseen, unknowable, unstoppable-?"
"I'm gonna unstop you if you don't stop talking like you're reading the seven-o'clock lead," Reverend Jackman spat. "Where do you get that stuff, anyway?"
Cooder shrugged. "All our news writers come over from the Enquirer. Saves us breaking them in."
"Figures."
Their eyes returned to the glass. The scimitars were in motion again. Once more the glass popped, the air reverberating with a metallic clang and crash. The sparks that leapt from the joined blades were as big as snowballs.
"You know," said Reverend Juniper Jackman, "I can't see what's got hold of those pigstickers, but I got me a notion it has something to do with that guy who tried to off us."
Don Cooder nodded. "I wasn't gonna bring this up, but just before everything came crashing down around us, did you happen to notice an Arab gal rip her clothes clean off?"
"Maybe," Reverend Jackman said hesitantly.
"Did you notice her arms?"
"Arms? Yeah, I noticed arms. A few."
"How many did you count?"
"I stopped at three," admitted Reverend Jackman. "Three arms on a woman is unchristian. I didn't wanna see no more."
"I counted four," muttered Don Cooder in a thin voice.
Silence fell in the dim room. Neither man had anything to add to that shared recollection.
A scimitar longer than a jet's wing twisted and slashed across the skyline. Its opponent blade drew back, avoiding the blow. The attacking blade continued uninterrupted.
It bit into the side of a building like a knife through cardboard. The building's facade abruptly collapsed. It was a cheap concrete apartment building, but still the concrete should not have crumbled so easily. The blow must have been terrific.
So must the backswing have been. It chopped a line of flagpoles, on which the Iraiti national flag fluttered in triplicate, clean in two.
"I figure the gal has the other blade," Reverend Jackman said at last. His voice was very small.
"I figure the same," said Don Cooder. "Thing of it is, why are they fightin'?"
"I think the gal broke the guy's neck."
"I thought it was the gal who had a neck that was broken," Cooder countered. "It leaned over to one side like a Texas buzzard eyeing a sick steer."
"Well, they both got broken necks, then. It happens.
The blades swung madly, dancing, emitting flashing rays of bronze and gold sunlight, as they waved and evaded one another.
"Looks like they're getting the hang of it now," Don Cooder said after a while.
Jackman squinted. "Look to you like they're getting closer?"
"Maybe? Why?"
" 'Cause if they are, we're right on the chopping block, I figure."
"When you suppose the bombs will start falling?"
"No tellin'."
"Then I vote we take our chances," said Cooder. "The way they're going at it, all those bombs will be good for is to smooth out the rubble anyway."
Reverend Jackman shook his head stubbornly. "Not me. This hunk of stone looks built to last. I'm stayin' right here until it ain't safe no more."
"If you're staying, then I'm staying," Cooder said, letting his famous granite jaw jut out like the prow on an Aegis cruiser. But his saggy eyes were uneasy.
All at once the glass in front of them simply fell out. And the gargantuan contending blades hadn't even connected.
Reverend Juniper Jackman and Don Cooder jumped back, grabbing one another in fear.
"I'll go if you'll go," Cooder whispered.
"I'll go if goin' stays our little secret," Jackman hissed.
"You won't tell my public?"
"If you don't breathe a word to my constituency."
"Deal, brother."
They bombed down the stairs holding hands like a two frightened children scampering from a haunted house.
Except that the true horrors lurked outside the building, not within it.
Chapter 4
General Razzik Azziz, defense minister of all Irait and occupied Kuran, burst into the headquarters of the Revolting Command Council, out of breath, his eyes sick with fear, and his brown face sheathed in a layer of perspiration deep enough to fry onion rings.
Most of the other council members had already beat him to the room, he was horrified to realize. They sat around the square council table, their identical mustaches twitching and quirking nervously.
To Azziz's profound surprise, none had claimed the seat formerly occupied by the late President Maddas Hinsein.
Sensing the opportunity to seize power by the simple application of his backside to morocco leather, General Razzik Azziz hastily plunked himself down.
He saw no opposition from the others, so his tight features broke into a wide grin under the sweat-dewed mustache.
"I hearby declare myself President for Life, the natural successor of our beloved leader, Maddas the Unforgettable," Azziz said in his most formal voice.
To his astonishment, the Revolting Command Councilor such of them as had survived the apparent coup in Arab Renaissance Square-burst out in relieved applause.
"I further hereby declare that from this day forward," he announced, "the decree that all Iraitis must emulate our former Precious Leader in all ways, especially as regards to facial hair, is this instant repealed."
More applause. President Razzik Azziz scowled. This was too easy. What were they up to?
"Henceforth," he added, "I will be addressed as al-Rais, the President."
Even more applause. Two men, the iron-haired foreign minister and the prissy-faced minister of information, stood up in a modest standing ovation.
"No," Azziz said suddenly. "Al-Ze'em, the Leader."
Everyone stood up now. The applause swelled.
This, President Razzik Azziz knew, was not typical Iraiti behavior in the halls of power. For thousands of years, going back to the empires of ancient Assyria and Babylon, the vestigial roots of modern Irait, the rulers of this land had to murder and torture their way to the top, and as often as not ultimately died by assassination.
Something was very, very wrong.
But, not having any clue as to what that might be, Azziz pushed on, consolidating power.
"Now that this is settled, we must deal with the Kuran problem," he announced as he motioned for the others to take their seats. "An accommodation must be reached with the American forces, who are not responsible for our ambassador's fate, according to secret information I have obtained."
"What about the Palestinian problem?" asked the minister of education.
President Azziz made a face. He turned to the information minister, saying, "Release this statement. 'I, President Razzik Azziz of the Republic of Irait, hereby declare that I will defend the cause of Palestine to the very last drop of Palestinian blood.' "
With that settled, so that no one would doubt his meaning, President Azziz went on: "We must get word to Washington of our intention to return the Arab land of Kuran to the scavengers who had held it. We no longer wish to inhabit it. We have everything of value anyway, including the imported English cobblestones."
"What about the United Nations forces?" the foreign minister asked.
"Once we retreat, they will advance into Kuran and establish a base near our true southern border. Then we shall never be rid of them."
"We will never be rid of them as long as they have an excuse to attack," President Azziz said, slapping the table. "Have this done. We will deal with the consequences later."
The foreign minister nodded. "At once."
"Then inform Washington and other capitals that from this moment on, the hostages-"
"Guests under duress," corrected the information minister, who had coined the diplomatic neologism.
"-guests under duress," finished President Azziz, "are free to leave without restriction or hindrance."
"Is that wise?" asked the minister of education.
President Azziz, seeing the beginnings of opposition, considered pulling out his service pistol and shooting the man dead where he sat. But upon reflection, he thought it impolitic to shoot council members in the first ten minutes of his term of office.
Instead he asked, "Why do you ask?"
"The American agents who are even now running amok in Arab Renaissance Square," offered the education minister. "Should you not make their surrender a condition of this gesture toward peace and goodwill?"
This was actually an excellent idea, thought President Azziz, who had momentarily forgotten the terrible sight in the square from which he and the others had fled.
He made a mental note to have the man tried for treason at the earliest pretext that presented itself. He was too smart for his own good. Besides, Azziz had a brother-in-law who would make a perfect education minister. The man could actually read.
"Let this be a condition of our terms," he pronounced.
Just then the cultural minister burst in, hot, sweaty, and thoroughly frightened.
"They are ruining the city!" he shouted. "Why does no one stop them?"
"Because we have no defense minister," replied President Azziz in a reasonable tone.
"But you are the defense minister, Azziz."
Then the cultural minister recognized that Razzik Azziz sat in the Precious Leader's chair.
"You may address me as al-Ze'em," said Razzik Azziz, pride causing his mustache to bristle manfully.
"Al-Ze'em, they are monsters," the man said quickly. "The woman is possessed by demons and the man roars like Shaitan himself unleashed upon the world. They have taken up the scimitars of Maddas Hinsein himself and are battling as if to end the world!"
"Who is winning?" demanded Azziz.
"I could not say. But Abominadad, it is surely losing. They have leveled the square and are moving this way."
"I promote you to defense minister, my brother, and charge you with the sacred duty of defending our ancient capital from naked aggression."
"The blond woman, her aggression is truly naked. For she wears no abayuh. Also, she possesses the limbs of a poisonous spider."
"Then exterminate them both this instant."
The new defense minister hastened away to perform his sacred duty.
President Azziz addressed the others. "I suggest we witness our unavoidable victory from the roof," he said confidently.
From the roof of the Palace of Sorrows they could see, imperfectly and only at intervals, the conflict raging several miles away.
Most often visible were the blades. The tiny figures that wielded them were not at all visible.
The clashing scimitars struck sparks that actually started small fires around the center of battle. Sirens whined. The roads were choked with the fleeing.
The green-onion shape of the Tomb of the Unknown Martyr shook like a ceramic bell as the scimitars clashed and sprang apart directly behind it.
"Can you see them?" asked the President.
"No, al-Ze'em!" came the crisp answer. "Only the great blades."
One scimitar twisted and whirled, pushing back at the other. On the backswing, it sliced through the green dome as if it were a simple bowl. The crash and rattle of falling debris made everyone assembled on the roof think of an earthquake.
"There!" said the education minister. "I see one! It is the yellow-haired demoness."
Between two buildings, Kimberly Baynes stepped into view. Her slim body was entirely nude. With each swing, her hair flung about like a horse's tail. The blade-its hilt larger than she-was firmly grasped by four spidery arms.
"She is very strong, even for a woman with four arms," a voice muttered.
"She had come to Greater Araby to sow destruction and flaunt her shameless un-Islamic customs," said President Azziz grimly.
"She is certainly flaunting her customs," said the culture minister turned defense minister, who had joined them. They noticed he was training a pair of field glasses on the scene.
"Are her . . . um . . . customs as large as those of our Arab women?" asked the president.
"No, they are actually quite small, these customs."
The field glasses began to make the rounds. Everyone wanted a peek at the surprisingly small charms of the American demon from hell.
Then they heard a whirring whup-whup-whup sound bouncing between the baroque manmade canyons of Abominadad.
From the north came a trio of Soviet-made Hind gunships. The big helicopters floated over the rooftops, their rotors amazingly quiet for such massive craft. Their desert-colored bodies were heavy with rocket pods and chin-mounted machine guns. They resembled nothing so much as high-tech baked potatoes.
The Hinds came in low, circled the zone of conflict once, and broke off to attack.
"They are doomed now," promised the defense minister.
A pod let go, gushing a string of rockets. They arrowed down toward the broken mosquelike monument, destroying it utterly.
The upraised blades poised in the air like startled moth feelers.
"They missed," said the education minister.
"The defense minister is new at his job," suggested the president, remembering how it had been for him. He had been a mere orderly at the start of the long Irait-Irug war. Twelve previous defense ministers had been executed or perished in "accidents" after displeasing former President Maddas Hinsein. Eventually Azziz had found himself next in line. Since execution came more quickly to those who declined field promotions than to those who angered the president, he had accepted the offer joyfully.
Another Hind made a run at the flashing scimitars.
This one cut loose with its chin-mounted machine gun. It seemed a sensible approach, inasmuch as the rate of fire was capable of felling a small forest. Until the other scimitar-the one not wielded by the nude blond demon-swept across the skyline and simply chopped the tail off the Hind.
It fell in two pieces. After it disappeared behind a baroque toadstool-shaped water tower, a fireball of boiling flame and sooty smoke ascended to the sky from the spot where it had last been seen.
The third Hind withdrew to a respectful distance, where it was quickly joined by the second. They hovered like fat dragonflies, lining up their guns and rocket pods.
"This is excellent," said the defense minister. "They are going to obliterate the demons now."
Evidently the so-called demons realized this too. They ceased their fearsome clash. The scimitars poised momentarily like a cosmic pair of shears.
Then one of them pulled back, paused, and swept out.
It was too far away to strike the menacing gunships, although they wobbled in the sky from the backwash of air.
The scimitar drew back all the way, disappearing from sight.
When it appeared again, it was a spinning disk of metal that flew through the air with an ominous sound like a gigantic bull roarer.
"Impossible!" President Azziz exploded. "He has thrown it!"
Like a giant rotor that had slipped its mast, the scimitar whirled toward the hovering Hinds.
Every member of the Revolting Command Council knew what the result was going to be. Only the defense minister, who saw his career going down in flames on the first day of the job, turned away as the giant scimitar decapitate
d the poised Hinds of their supporting rotors.
The rotors flew off in two directions, shedding sharp blades that caught the glancing sunlight. One snapped a minaret like a breadstick.
The Hinds dropped like baked potatoes from seared hands and the blast of fire that they surrendered upon impact caused the sweat on every face of the Revolting Command Council to evaporate.
"What should we do?" muttered the defense minister. "The Americans are obviously unstoppable."
"Why do you ask us?" demanded Razzik Azziz. "You are the new defense minister."
"But you are the old one, al-Ze'em. You have expertise in these matters. I am only a fortunate culture minister. All I know is torture and espionage. Neither of which applies here."
Razzik Azziz looked out over the smoke and flames peppering the heart of the city. Only one scimitar waved amid the boiling smoke. Oddly, it had grown quiescent, as if the wielder was unwilling to carry on mortal combat with his unarmed opponent.
"I say we immediately release all hostages and surrender unconditionally," Azziz said.
"If you do that," put in the education minister, "the Americans will insist upon war-crimes tribunals and necks to fill out their cruel nooses."
"Then we will surrender the architect of these crimes, our dead Precious Leader," Azziz said.
"But the Americans will insist upon a live neck. What they call a scrape goat."
"Scapegoat," corrected President Razzik Azziz, who was growing impatient with this too-smart education minister. "Whom should we offer them?"
On the roof of the Palace of Sorrows, the eyes of the Revolting Command Council flicked away from the face of their leader. Guilty looks made their expressions strange.
"Answer me!" demanded President Azziz.
It was, of course, the insolent education minister who offered a trembling opinion.
"It is not whom we will offer them, al-Ze'em," he said tightly. "It is whom they will insist upon hanging. And with our beloved Maddas in the merciful hands of Allah, you, al-Ze'em, are the natural choice."
President Razzik Azziz blinked, a nervous tic crawling along his mustachioed features. It started at his left eye, worked down diagonally, causing his nostrils to flare, and finally sent his mustache jerking like an inchworm on a hot plate.
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