A Pound of Prevention td-121 Read online

  Bubu nodded dumbly.

  "Gather your other weapons," Chiun commanded.

  The Luzus had left spears beyond the fence. Quickly collecting them, they hurried onto the rolling lawn of the presidential palace. With a pensive frown, Chiun stooped and snagged the hair of the dead lieutenant, hefting the head in the air. Grisly bundle in hand, he joined the natives in their determined race across the lush green lawn.

  THE LATE-DAY SUN WAS HOT On Remo's back as he wandered up the broad sidewalk.

  This section of town was far better than the part he'd been in earlier that day. It seemed that the criminal activity of the rest of Bachsburg wasn't tolerated near the main government buildings.

  His stroll along the tidy, well-swept sidewalks was a balm to his troubled soul. He had almost begun to feel better when he stumbled on the first body.

  The man was some kind of soldier. A long blade had slit his abdomen from sternum to pelvis. Dead organs yawned from the wide gash.

  Blood ran like a sticky red river away from the palace gates. There it collected in dry pores in the concrete, soaking into the arid sidewalk.

  Remo stepped around the still damp stain, peeking around the high brick column to which the open gate was attached.

  More bodies were spread all around the mouth of the drive. The blade strokes employed against all these men were surprisingly clean. Almost as if...

  A troublesome thought suddenly occurred to him. Frowning, he crouched beside the nearest body. There were deep lacerations in the man's neck but very little blood on the face of the wound. The blade had gone in and out fast. Blood loss had occurred after the body had fallen.

  The cuts were clean. Too clean.

  Standing, Remo's eyes darted left, then right. "What are you up to?" he muttered as he searched the immediate grounds. No one was around.

  Stepping farther up the drive, he found the final proof he needed.

  The headless body of a Citizen Force lieutenant lay near the empty guard booth. A rifle sat in three neat sections near the man's severed hand. His head was nowhere to be found.

  "Dammit, Chiun, can't you ever give me a minute's peace?" Remo growled.

  Bloodstained footprints led to the lawn. Twelve barefoot men. Even though he didn't see a trail, Remo knew with certainty that a thirteenth set of feet had followed that same bloody path.

  "Smith is gonna go apeshit over this one." Scowling with his entire spirit, Remo stole across the lawn, following the path made by the skulking Luzu warriors.

  ASSISTANT CHIEF OF STAFF O. U. Queene was preparing to leave his small office in the East African presidential palace when the door burst open.

  Looking up from his desk, he was startled to see a group of armed natives swarming into the room. Queene fell back in his chair.

  "What is the meaning of this?" he gasped. He eyed their spears and machetes with dread.

  The natives failed to answer. As Queene blinked in abject terror, the two men standing directly before his cluttered desk silently parted. Between them stepped a tiny figure in a green robe. The wizened Asian carried something in his long, tapered fingers. When Queene saw what that something was, he clapped a horrified hand over his mouth.

  Chiun plopped Lieutenant I. P. Freeley's severed head onto a pile of paperwork. Dead eyes stared vacantly forward, a hint of last-minute terror etched forever in their darkest recesses. From within the black orifice of a mouth, a fat white tongue jutted out at O. U. Queene.

  "Where is the evil one?" Chiun intoned.

  "Oh, my ...oh my..." Queene blinked. He was staring into the hypnotic orbs of the dead lieutenant.

  "Answer me!" Chiun snapped, slapping a palm to the desk. The severed head bounced.

  "Oh, um, who?"

  "Mandobar," Chiun said.

  "Oh." Queene nodded. "He's, oh... He's not here. Election. New president. Um, Kmpali. Maintains a small office. But not here now. They're both gone."

  Chiun whirled to the Luzus. "This one spoke the truth," he said, waving to the lieutenant's head.

  "I can pencil you in for an appointment," Queene offered numbly, gathering up his blackbound scheduling book. When he reached for a pen, he found a lolling tongue. He recoiled. "Tell you what, I'll remember," he promised.

  When the assistant chief of staff looked up hopefully, the old man and the Luzu warriors were gone. Unfortunately, they'd forgotten to take their decapitated head with them.

  The political aide rose stiffly from his chair. He found a small towel and tossed it gingerly over the head.

  On deliberate, plodding feet, he made his way to the bathroom where he proceeded to vomit up a year's worth of stomach acids into the gleaming white bowl.

  THE TRAIL OF CITIZEN FORCE bodies led to a side door of the palace. Slipping through the massive door, Remo found three more bodies on the polished floor of the ornate foyer.

  Again, he noticed the cleanness of the blade strokes. They were too precise for normal men. To Remo Williams, Apprentice Reigning Master of Sinanju, the incisions were disturbing on a level far beyond mere murder.

  There was a time when Masters of Sinanju used weapons. But after the Great Wang-the first Master of the modern Sinanju age-weapons became obsolete. Never ones to throw away a potential moneymaker, however, some of the earliest Masters of the post-Wang age had sometimes sold some of the outdated weapons techniques to wealthy clients-this so that the buyer could feel as if he were getting some kind of lasting legacy from Sinanju. As far as Remo knew, this practice and the skills of those thus trained hadn't survived much beyond Sinanju's earliest contracts with Egypt and Phoenicia. Yet here it surfaced, a full continent away.

  Another body steered Remo up the grand marble staircase. Aside from the ghosts of those slain, the palace seemed deserted. Remo followed the grisly trail up to the third floor. A few droplets of blood led him to an open office door. He found the missing guard's head peeking out from under a towel on a desk. Somewhere distant came the sound of violent retching.

  "Okay, I give up," Remo grumbled from the doorway. "Where are you?"

  As if in response, an angry shout issued from beyond the closed office window. Hurrying across the room, Remo found that the window overlooked a broad rear parking area.

  He spotted Chiun instantly.

  The Master of Sinanju and a dozen loinclothwearing natives were running alongside an L-shaped addition that stabbed out behind the palace. The group had fled the main wing of the building in which Remo now stood. The old Korean was obviously taking a slower pace so as not to outdistance his companions.

  From his vantage point, Remo was able to see something Chiun and the natives couldn't. A phalanx of armed soldiers was sweeping across the lot from the other direction.

  Alone in his upper-story office, the sound of desperate dry-heaving issuing from an adjacent bathroom, Remo had a moment's hesitation.

  Chiun had abandoned him at the airport without so much as a backward glance. It'd be just deserts to leave him here. Let him and his pack of Johnny Weissmuller wanna-bes figure out a way out of this mess.

  But though the impulse to abandon his mentor was strong, conscience got the better of him. "Ungrateful old geezer," Remo snarled as he snapped the seal on the bulletproof window.

  The window rocketed up into the frame, embedding itself deep in the thick wood casing. Glass panes rattled as Remo scampered out onto the inch wide ledge beneath the window. He took off along it at a sprint.

  Far below, the two converging groups had just encountered each other. Across the parking lot, the pop-pop-pop of automatic rifle fire rose into the humid air.

  At the corner of the main palace wing, Remo's hands and feet snagged the inlaid white bricks. Using toes and fingertips, he descended rapidly to the ground. He was off in a flash the instant his feet touched the earth. The soles of his Italian loafers failed to disturb a single blade of grass as he flew after the Master of Sinanju. Gliding from grass to asphalt, he was halfway to Chiun before he was finally spotted by the appro
aching Citizen Force guards.

  Bullets began whizzing in his direction.

  Though the president was away, there were still many state vehicles parked in the lot. As Remo raced past a big sedan, trailing bullet holes peppered its side in his wake. Still more bullets shattered car windows, spraying glass onto empty seats.

  Dodging flying lead with every step, Remo caught up with the Master of Sinanju in a small garden at the far edge of the parking lot.

  Luzu warriors crouched in a defensive line. Rows of parked cars separated them from the approaching soldiers. When Remo ducked from sight, the gunfire stopped abruptly. His sensitive ears heard the hushed exchanges as the Citizen Force soldiers continued to press their cautious advance.

  Chiun stood unconcerned in the shadow of a bush trimmed by palace groundskeepers into the shape of a leaping tiger.

  When Remo appeared in their midst, the Luzus reacted with raised spears and machetes. At a harsh word from Bubu, however, they let him pass. They returned to their crouches as Remo stormed up to the Master of Sinanju.

  "Have you gone nuts?" Remo snapped at the maddeningly serene old man. "This is the goddamn presidential palace of East Africa you just sliced and diced your way through." He jerked an angry thumb at the natives. "Who the hell are these clowns?"

  "They are friends of the House of Sinanju," Chiun replied blandly.

  "Oh, yeah? Since when do we make friends?" He was interrupted by two Citizen Force soldiers who picked that moment to leap out from behind the last row of cars. The Luzus moved so fast, the soldiers' rifles proved irrelevant. Hurled spears pierced chests. Flashing machetes removed arms and heads. As the soldiers fell, the Luzus screamed a triumphant battle cry.

  "And another thing," Remo asked, turning from the mauled bodies. "What's with these moves of theirs? That's pre-Wang if I've ever seen it, and according to the history you drilled into me, Pharaoh Ikhnaton's the last guy we sold the old techniques to. So unless these jokers are some wandering lost tribe of ancient Egyptians, I smell another Masters' Scrolls cover-up."

  The blossoming look of anger on his teacher's face was all the proof Remo needed to know he'd struck paydirt.

  "I knew it!" he exclaimed.

  Chiun scowled. "Take your fanciful deductions elsewhere," he spit.

  "You're not dodging this one that easily," Remo warned. "I assume they paid on time?"

  "Always," Chiun retorted. But though the word was spoken sharply, there was just a hint of hesitation in his voice.

  "And paid well, too, I bet," Remo accused. Chiun refused to be drawn in.

  "Can I assume that since you have found the time to bother me that you are over your silly self-absorption?" he asked.

  "Don't change the subject," Remo said. "Chiun, Smith is gonna go berserk over this. He's already ticked at me just for talking to one measly stranger."

  Chiun's face was bland. "Why?" he asked. "Did you purchase more magic beans?"

  "Very funny," Remo said.

  More soldiers swarmed the area. Only one managed to get off a shot before the Luzus cut them to ribbons.

  "It was some high muckity-muck in what's left of the government," Remo said, waving a hand at the mounting stack of bodies. "Smith was going to bench me and send you in, but now you've flown off on some crazy Edgar Rice Burroughs safari."

  By this point, the number of Citizen Force soldiers had been greatly reduced. The Luzu warriors swept around the parked government cars, finishing off the cowering remnants of the presidential guard with quick machete strokes. A few distant soldiers fled on foot. The Luzus didn't give chase.

  When the victorious warriors raced back to the Master of Sinanju, Bubu led the pack.

  "Not you again," Remo groused.

  The native ignored him. "The battle is ours, Master of Sinanju," Bubu panted.

  Chiun nodded. "Let us hasten back to Luzuland," he intoned seriously. "We must inform your chief not only that his enemy has fled in fear, but that he must prepare his people for government retribution for our actions."

  The barefoot Luzus took off like a shot, jumping the curb and flying back across the lawn. Before Chiun could sprint off with them, Remo snagged him by one flapping kimono sleeve.

  "Wait a damn minute," he snapped. "You can't run off after all this. We'll probably have to get out of the country. Smith's gonna be shitting bricks when news of this massacre gets out."

  Chiun's eyes were shards of hazel ice. "I am honoring a contract far older than Smith," he said hotly. "Sinanju worked for the Luzu Empire long before there even was an America."

  "I'm sure that'll be a real comfort to him," Remo replied angrily. He threw up his hands in disgust. "Fine," he snarled. "Go traipsing into the jungle and reenact more scenes from Luzu Dawn for all I care. But I am not covering for you on this one."

  Chiun's wrinkled face grew dark. "That is because you are a good son, Remo," he said with bitter sarcasm. "And good sons always turn like hissing vipers on their fathers in times of need. Tell your precious Smith whatever you want. And when you are through punishing me for your unjust world, perhaps you will find one minute to consider who you owe more to, Smith or me."

  With that final biting accusation, he was gone. The old Korean became a flouncing green blur as he raced around the side of the building in the wake of the fleeing Luzus.

  This wasn't how he'd wanted to leave it. Remo hadn't even had a chance to ask his teacher about the little Korean boy who seemed to be haunting his every step. Scowling from the sting of Chiun's words, Remo turned to go, as well.

  Something caught his attention.

  Standing among the corpses, he heard the sound of a lone car engine. It was coming up the long stone driveway behind a high hedge. Remo was ready to bolt when through a break in the shrubs he saw the shadowy image of a familiar face behind a tinted windshield.

  He hesitated.

  There might yet be a way to salvage this. Of course, he'd have to do it without Smith's approval. And in that moment, Remo came to what he decided was the most well-thought-out decision of his life. "Ah, screw it," he snarled.

  Folding his arms over his chest, he waited for the approaching government car to find him ankle deep in bodies.

  Chapter 12

  The nervous chauffeur of East African Defense Minister L. Vas Deferens wanted to turn the government car around as soon as he spotted the first decapitated body sprawled across the great gravel drive at the rear of the palace.

  "Sir?" the man asked anxiously, looking over his shoulder at his cold-as-ice employer.

  "Drive!" Deferens barked.

  Nodding, the driver skirted the body and continued along past the row of high shrubs that ran parallel to the road. Worried eyes scanned for machete-wielding Luzus.

  Reports of the attack on the palace had been issued over the car radio. According to the internal defense ministry broadcast, the Luzu nation had taken up arms against the ruling government for the first time in more than one hundred years.

  Until Minister Deferens had ordered complete radio silence, the news had been horrifying. Decapitations, eviscerations-it was an East Africa that hadn't existed since before the time of their greatgrandparents.

  At this time of evening and with the president out of the country, there hadn't been many people inside the palace. A few terrified government workers had fled into the street. Deferens's driver wanted more than anything to join them.

  Up ahead, two more bodies lay on the road next to the thick hedge. The driver stopped before the headless corpses.

  "What are you doing?" Deferens demanded.

  "More bodies, sir," the driver said tightly, struggling to keep down his lunch.

  Two white hands gripped the back of the driver's seat. Deferens leaned far over to the windshield, his handsome face pinched. The chauffeur hoped the sight of the bodies would force his employer to come to his senses. He was ready to put the car in reverse and back the hell out of there when the defense minister glanced at him, his eyes flat.
/>   "Drive over them," Deferens ordered coldly. The chauffeur looked at the mangled corpses. "Um, but sir..."

  Deferens leaned very close to the man, bringing his perfect pale face an inch from the driver's ear. The defense minister's breath was sweet.

  "Or get out and I will drive," he said menacingly.

  The tires smoked as the car lurched forward. Two body-flattening bumps and the road leveled off.

  L. Vas Deferens settled, annoyed, back into the seat. He didn't appear at all concerned that he was driving toward a mob of rampaging Luzus.

  In the rear of the car, Deferens drummed his pale fingers impatiently on the door's dark molded handle.

  The limo crunched up the gravel road, finally breaking around the high hedge and into a circular lot lined with huge pots filled with topiary animals.

  There were mutilated corpses scattered in a wide area around the parked cars of the adjacent lot. And standing amid the dead was a lone figure.

  The chauffeur had been at the door of the restaurant when Remo eliminated Johnny Fungillo's lunch companions. Seeing the same man calmly standing amid these bodies, the driver felt a hard knot of fear tighten in his belly.

  As the car headed for him, Remo neither flinched nor budged. In the back seat, Deferens leaned forward, his eyes narrowing in suspicion at the sight of Remo.

  "What is he doing here?" he said to himself.

  "Shall I drive over him?" the chauffeur asked hopefully.

  Deferens didn't hear him. "Stop the car," he demanded.

  "Um, right here, or on him?" the driver asked.

  "Now!"

  The chauffeur slammed on the brakes. Spitting stones, the long car screeched to a stop five feet from Remo. Deferens didn't wait for his driver to open his door. Popping it open, he jumped out into a pool of coagulating blood. He stormed around the front of the car to Remo.

  "What is the meaning of this outrage?" the defense minister snapped at Remo.

  "That's a relief," Remo exhaled. "So you're saying this isn't a typical day around here?" More cars raced up the drive. Soldiers spilled from them and from around the side of the building.