Cold Warrior td-91 Page 11

  "Well," Remo said, standing up. "we know Zorilla wasn't driving a submarine car." He looked up. "I don't see anything in the sky, either."

  "Come," said Chiun, moving back the way they had come.

  Remo followed.

  "What are we looking for?" he asked, curious.

  "We are looking for nothing. We are smelling the air."

  Remo focused on his nostrils and drew in a sip of air. The air passing over his sensitive olfactory receptors was reasonably clean, for all its proximity to the sprawling city of Furioso.

  "I don't smell anything," Remo complained.

  "But you will."

  Remo did. He picked up the tailpipe emission from Zorilla's car a quarter-mile back. It went off to the left.

  Remo spotted the crushed-down kudzu on one side of the artificial road.

  "Must have missed it in the darkness," he said.

  They moved into the kudzu. The carbon monoxide vapor, odorless to most noses, was heavy in theirs, so they switched to breathing through their mouths. It made their thoughts heavy.

  Against a low hillock, they found it. A concrete bunker, nearly buried in the dirt and obscured by kudzu. The door was a big slab of steel, painted brown and green to blend in with the surroundings.

  There were no signs. No guards, no anything.

  "Looks military," Remo said quietly.

  Chiun nodded. "We have found the lair of the plotters."

  "All we have to do is get in."

  "All we have to do is get in," came the voice over the overhead loudspeaker.

  "Director, we have a security breach."

  The Director looked up from his console, where he had been wireframing three touching circles. He was in the act of commanding this remarkable newfangled computer to "draw" a pair of eyes in the large bottom circle when the word came.

  He turned in his swivel chair to the overhead monitor, cursing the eye patch that restricted his vision and adding another for the stupid doctor who could have saved the eye-if only he had had the gumption to stick to his guns.

  He saw two men moving through the stark highcontrast image transmitted from the infrared scanner.

  "Who the hell are they?" he demanded in a gravelly voice.

  "Unknown, Director."

  "The little guy looks like he strayed out of a bad Saturday morning cartoon."

  The Director picked up the telephone handset at his elbow, inadvertently hitting the dial buttons embedded in it.

  "Damn these things! What was wrong with the rotary dial?"

  He hit the switch hook and tapped the pound key.

  "Yes?"

  "Get me that weasel Drake," he snapped.

  "At once, sir."

  A cautious voice came on the line.

  "You wanted me, Director?"

  "There are two of them, and they're sniffing at the back door like a couple of hound dogs at a fireplug."

  "I'm patching into the visual feed now."

  "Good for you," the Director said acidly. The man was a toady.

  "Director, they fit the description of the pair Zorilla encountered earlier this evening."

  "That idiot must have let them follow him. Where is he?"

  "On his way to my office for debriefing and reassignment."

  "Decruit him."

  "Yes, Director. What about the intruders?"

  "I'm going to have them let in."

  "Director?"

  "Well, we can't very well let them go running back to the CIA or the Cuban DGI, now can we?"

  "No, Director. We can't."

  "You deal with Zorilla. He's your speed. I'll handle these two."

  The Director hung up abruptly. He turned to a blank-faced uniformed figure, standing guard at the door.

  "You, flunky. Open the door for our curious guests."

  "Yes, Director."

  "And have them interrogated and processed out with the rest of the trash."

  "Yes, Director."

  The Director went back to his computer screen. He tapped a key and the eyes drew themselves. He added a smiling mouth and a button nose.

  "Not bad," he murmured contentedly. "Not bad, if I do say so myself."

  He added his famous signature with the tap of another key.

  "We are being observed," intoned the Master of Sinanju.

  "Infrared?" Remo asked.

  "I feel warm rays."

  "Infrared," Remo said.

  They were crouched in the rank kudzu, studying the massive portal.

  Remo's dark eyes raked the structure. The ground under his feet thrummed and throbbed, as if from mighty machinery.

  "Think they can hear us, too?"

  "It does not matter," said Chiun.

  "I don't see any way in except through that huge bulkhead, but there's gotta be a vent shaft or something."

  Just then whining servo-motors cut the air, and with a metallic uncoiling the great door began to rise.

  "Looks like we've been invited in," Remo said doubtfully.

  The Master of Sinanju stood up. His hands going to his wrists and both disappearing under closing sleeves, he said, "Then let us be gracious and accept this kindness."

  Face calm, he started forward. Remo followed, not looking happy at all.

  Chapter 13

  Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla walked the cavernous walkways, which were scrubbed clean with military spotlessness.

  Two soldiers in insignia-less uniforms came along driving a rubber-tired utility vehicle, like a golf cart on steroids. It was an unmilitary turquoise.

  The driver said, "Hop on, sir. Drake will see you immediately."

  "Gracias," said Comandante Zorilla, getting in back. He sat facing away from the driver. The rubber-tired utility vehicle turned smartly and zipped back the way it had come.

  The tunnels were a bewildering maze of alabaster conduits and ivory corridors. Overhead pipes and aluminum ductwork of all descriptions clustered against the high ceilings. It is a wondrous place, Zorilla thought to himself, marvelous for all the things that are controlled down here.

  Along one long stretch the air reverberated with a rushing like a vast vacuum, and the ceiling appeared to be one huge pipe.

  "What is this roaring pipe?" Zorilla wondered.

  "Waste-disposal," the driver said. "Takes all the trash and debris from topside and dumps it into trash-compactors for removal."

  "Ah, brilliant," said Zorilla admiringly.

  The utility vehicle came to a dead end and stopped, with but an inch between its rubber bumpers and a steel sliding door.

  Zorilla was taken to the door and the driver inserted a magnetic card into a chrome-mouthed slot. The door rolled back, revealing a common elevator interior.

  "The lift will take you where you need to go," said the driver.

  "Gracias, " said Zorilla again, stepping aboard. The door rolled shut. The lift rose.

  The ride was short. The doors slipped open, and he was looking into a conference room rich in woods and indirectly lit.

  When he had stepped off, a cherry-wood panel rolled back into place, concealing all traces of the lift.

  "Please be seated, Comandante," said a voice. It was coming from a lonely-looking speakerphone atop the long conference table.

  Zorilla took the seat at the end.

  "Comandante, I have been in touch with the Director. He sends his sincere regrets. The loss of Ultima Hora was an avoidable tragedy. They are the worst kind."

  "Gracias, Senor Drake," said Zorilla in a thick voice.

  "The organization commends your bravery under fire and your willingness to execute distasteful duties."

  "I am a soldier of the Americas," Zorilla said simply.

  "We know you are. And we know that you would never willingly betray the operation, as Dr. Revuelta has."

  "Revuelta?"

  "He was in touch by phone. The two who followed you here approached him. Revuelta gave you up under torture."

  "Followed me here? What do you mean, follo
wed me here?"

  "Dr. Revuelta has offered his sincere apologies."

  "I accept," Zorilla said quickly. "But by what do you mean, 'followed me here'? No one followed me here."

  "The two unknown unfriendlies did," Drake's voice said flatly. The tonality of the speakerphone was perfect. There was no distortion. It was as if the man were in the room, but invisible.

  "I do not believe it," Zorilla said bitingly.

  A frosted wall panel glowed into life. On the oversized screen appeared corridors similar to the ones Comandante Zorilla had just traveled. The lean Anglo and the ancient Korean were visible, examining a line of trucks.

  "Impossible," he hissed.

  "But as you can see, true."

  "What would you have me do?"

  "The Director asks that you accept decruitment."

  Zorilla recoiled, as if from the lash of a whip.

  "But I am prepared to go on," he protested. "I have trained to lead the landing party."

  "The operation has redundancy built into it at all levels."

  "But I am a key component."

  "None of us is key. Except the Director. We have to assume the unknown unfriendlies have superiors they have already reported to. Your name is known. But the trail ends here. No one leaves. Therefore there are no further leads."

  "But-"

  "Comandante, the future of the operation, not to mention the fate of your native land, hangs in the balance. I ask that you reflect on the situation, and your operational responsibilities. You have your orders."

  "Si, " said Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla, unbuttoning the blouse pocket of his insignia-less uniform and extracting a pack of chewing gum.

  His eyes on the screen as the camera tracked the two strange men, he mechanically slid off the paper wrapper and peeled the foil from the gum. Ever the military man, he took the refuse and with the remaining pack replaced them in his blouse pocket, which he rebuttoned.

  Then, he put the stick into his mouth and began to chew.

  He was still watching the screen when his eyes rolled back in his head and he keeled over.

  After a few minutes, the cherry-wood panel slid open and two uniformed soldiers stepped out. They checked the body for signs of life and, finding none, went to a blank wall.

  A magnetic keycard caused a chutelike drawer to drop down.

  A faint howling came from far below.

  Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla's still warm body went feet-first into this. The drawer closed on his thick black hair, and the soldiers disappeared into the elevator.

  After a moment the image of the two figures on the screen winked out and the room was still, except for the quiet hum of the air conditioner.

  Chapter 14

  The great door dropped, and a locking latch as big as a nautical anchor rolled up out of the poured concrete floor and secured the guillotine of steel.

  "This," Remo said uneasily, "reminds me of one of those underground nuclear command centers."

  The Master of Sinanju looked about the space before them. It was a parking area. There were cars, vans, a few forklifts, and a pair of golf cart-like utility vehicles.

  Some of the vehicles sported insignia. Curious, Remo went to one and examined it.

  It consisted of a white circle encompassing three black disks. A large bottom circle topped by side-by-side smaller duplicates. All three disks overlapped.

  "Looks familiar," Remo muttered. "But I can't place it."

  "I, too, have seen this arcane symbol."

  "Where?"

  The Master of Sinanju stroked his smoky tendril of a beard. His eyes narrowed. "I do not know. Perhaps it is the symbol of some cabalistic secret society."

  "Could be," said Remo, looking around. He tested the back of one of the vans. It came open.

  "Hey, Chiun! Check this out!"

  The Master of Sinanju came around to the back.

  The entire van was stacked with cloth-covered poles, like cordwood. Remo pulled one from the top of the stack.

  A corner of a red cloth unraveled. Remo gave the pole a crack and unfurled a red flag, on which the three-black-circles-in-a-white-circle symbol swam.

  "It's some kind of national flag," Remo said.

  Chiun made a face. "I know of no such nation."

  "Maybe it's supposed to be the flag of the new Cuba," Remo mused. "The three circles must stand for something. Either that, or the Neo-Nazis are into circles these days."

  "Hark," Chiun said suddenly.

  "Hark?"

  "I hear something."

  "Oh." Remo tossed the flag away and went to one of the rubber-tired open carts, saying, "Come on."

  Remo found a key in the ignition. The head was shaped in the three-circle style. He turned it and an electric motor caught.

  Remo sent the car around in a circle as the Master of Sinanju leapt aboard.

  "Why walk when we can ride?" Remo said.

  "Hear hear," said Chiun.

  There was only one exit from the tunnel, so Remo sent the cart humming into that.

  They passed into a long service corridor filled with the monotonous thrum of air conditioning and other mechanical sounds.

  "Big place," Remo said.

  "Remo. What is an animator?"

  "A guy who draws cartoons," Remo said, noticing a closed door with a sign that said: ANIMATORS' MESS.

  "We know that can't be right," he grunted. "Must be a goofy code name. Military types love to play word games."

  Just then a lavender cart scooted out of a side passage and turned in their direction. It was driven by a soldier in a white jumpsuit and helmet. Another soldier sat blank-faced behind him. They looked like identical twins going to some sort of military First Communion.

  Remo steered over to the left and said, "Signal a right, will you, Little Father?"

  "Gladly," said Chiun, as Remo pressed the accelerator to the rubber floorboards.

  The two carts barreled toward one another in a quiet game of chicken.

  The other car swerved first. It went right, because there was no way to go left without slamming into the wall.

  As they passed, the Master of Sinanju jutted out a bony arm and decapitated the soldier next to the driver.

  The driver lost control when the person seated beside him became an organic red fountain that gushed hot liquid into his face.

  The cart went nose-first into a wall and turned over, pinning the driver.

  Remo took the left-hand tunnel, saying, "Nice job."

  "Director, we have a problem," said Captain Maus.

  "Solve it," said the Director, making the face on the computer screen revolve on an imaginary axis. His signature revolved with it, became alternately readable, a thin stitching of electronics and reversed. He frowned.

  "How do you get this thing to freeze the signature?"

  "Director, the unknowns have just decapitated a soldier."

  The Director turned and looked up. The screen showed the overturned utility vehicle and the quivering mess that had been the guard.

  The Director sniffed, "I've seen worse," and returned to his play. If this operation was to succeed, these snot-noses would have to learn to solve the little problems for themselves.

  As the tunnel walls whipped by, Remo Williams was saying, "I figure this for a military installation, probably funded by ultra-right-wing Cubans out to topple Fidel. There's probably an orange grove or something over our heads. It's the perfect cover."

  "I do not understand this 'wing' thing," Chiun complained.

  "Our ultra left wing is the same as Cuba's ultra right wing."

  "Thank you for enlightening me. Not."

  Remo shrugged.

  "All we need is to find the big cheese, wring some truth out of him, and contact Smith," he said. "Smith will tell us if we take down this place or leave it to the Marines."

  They passed side tunnels every few yards. Brief glimpses showed white-uniformed soldiers pushing white-handled push brooms.

  "Whoever
runs this place must have a mania for cleanliness," Remo said.

  "There is nothing wrong with that," Chiun sniffed.

  "You'd think, since they know we're here, they'd have the place on alert. But I don't see any signs of panic."

  "The answer to that conundrum is obvious."

  "Yeah? Explain it to an ex-Marine then."

  "The overlord of this vault does not yet know he has allowed Sinanju into his lair."

  The way was suddenly blocked by two rows of white-uniformed soldiers.

  "But he's about to find out," Remo muttered, bringing the utility vehicle to a slow stop.

  "Halt, please," ordered a soldier.

  Remo lifted empty hands off the steering wheel. "Too late. We already did. Next order?"

  "Dismount, please."

  "We under arrest, or just prisoners?"

  Rifle safeties latched off.

  "You will please dismount instantly."

  "Ride's over, Little Father," said Remo, stepping off the truck.

  The Master of Sinanju stepped away from the vehicle as well.

  They were surrounded at riflepoint.

  "Last guys who did that to us ended up with their trigger fingers in splints," Remo offered in the way of friendly information.

  "Place your hands atop your heads, please."

  "Since you're all so polite I guess we can't say no, can we Little Father?"

  "We will allow them to keep their fingers," Chiun said thinly. "For now."

  They placed their hands atop their heads. Remo took a moment to scrutinize the faces surrounding them. The men all had a fresh, well-scrubbed look, like Boy Scouts coming into early manhood. The weapons at their shoulders were American-made Colt AR-15s. Purchasable at many sporting-goods stores. There was no hint of ethnicity in any of the faces. In fact, they looked corn-fed, most of them.

  Remo frowned. More and more this was looking like a U.S. military operation. But who the hell was running it, and why?

  Remo decided there was only one way to find out.

  "Take us to your leader," he said, straight-faced.

  The circle broke, and half the soldiers formed up behind them. The others formed an honor guard of sorts.

  "March, please," the leader requested.

  They marched.

  "Why are they so polite?" Chiun wanted to know.

  Remo shrugged as best he could. "Search me."

  "No talking in the ranks, please."