The Wrong Stuff td-125 Read online

  Fire roiled hot below, turning the placid blue sea into a savage orange. Clouds of steam burst upward, blotting his vision and flooding the air like some superheated outdoor sauna.

  His feet slapping against the boiling water's swirling surface, Remo raced to where the shore had been. Blisters erupted on the soles of his feet.

  The long sleek shape of the fuel tank appeared through the dense fog to his left. Though all around was boiling, there was no heat from the insulated tank.

  Banking left, Remo ran for the metal casing. By now he had run past the firing boosters. With a leap he bounded from the surface of the bubbling water, plastering himself against the rounded side.

  The huge tank bucked like a rodeo bull, yet Remo's fingers remained plastered to the side. It couldn't last much longer. He'd hold on until it was over.

  He was riding out the bone-rattling vibrations when he suddenly felt something at his bare ankle. Twisting around, he caught a glimpse of a furry black appendage sticking up from below the surface of the water.

  One of Mr. Gordons's spider legs. Like a coiling snake it wrapped tight around his ankle.

  Remo couldn't fight without loosening his grip.

  A million thoughts flooded through his mind at the same time, none good.

  The fuel continued to burn. The tank beneath him shook madly. At the far end flames still tore wildly at the sea.

  And in a single moment of bursting clarity, Remo realized that there was a chance.

  In the instant when he felt the yank on his ankle that he knew would come, Remo released his grip, allowing himself to be pulled below the ocean's bubbling surface.

  Chapter 31

  The water burned his skin. His clothes stuck against his blistering flesh like a hot shroud.

  Although Remo was at the side of the tank, away from the belching flames, the water all around was superheated beyond even Sinanju tolerance.

  The grip on his ankle never weakened.

  Although his entire body screamed in pain, Remo endured. He shut down the nerve endings in his skin, canceling out warnings that were redundant.

  Another minute in that boiling inferno and he'd be dead. But for what he had planned, Remo wouldn't need a minute.

  Gordons seemed content to hold him in place, allowing the boiling water to finally do for him the task he had for years failed to accomplish on his own.

  Remo refused to satisfy the android's blood lust. Twisting, Remo swam downward. Gordons unreeled his leg to its full length, allowing Remo to taste freedom.

  The water cooled slightly the lower he went. Ever mindful of the grip around his ankle, he raked the sea floor with his hand.

  His fingers had just clutched on to something when he felt himself being yanked back up.

  Gordons was toying with him.

  But Remo was no toy. He was a man. More than that. He was a Master of Sinanju, a being trained to the full potential of both mind and body. And compared to this the machine that was attempting to extinguish the flame that was his life was little more than a child's plaything.

  Shooting up from the sea bottom, Remo opened his lids to a slivered squint. A protective film of thick mucus instantly formed on the surface of his eyes. Through the haze and the pain and the boiling water-surrounded by a backdrop of raging flameRemo saw close-up the form of Mr. Gordons.

  The android had altered his shape once more. Half man, half spider, Gordons's human head was studying its victim with clinical dispassion.

  Remo's grip tightened around the object in his hand.

  It was one of the basalt rocks that littered the shore around Merritt Island. He kept the small, sharp rock hidden behind his body as he floated in toward the android.

  Gordons failed to notice the weapon.

  Remo kept his body limp, as if the life had all but drained from it. When he came within arm's reach of his attacker, Remo thrust the rock out, hard.

  The makeshift knife stuck deep in the android's chest cavity. When Remo jerked upward, the human veneer and the protective heat panels beneath it yawned wide.

  Sparks erupted from the cavity.

  The blow had to have severed some of Gordons's motor controls, for the android's spider legs went limp. The tightness at Remo's ankle lessened.

  Slashing down with his hand, Remo severed the leg. Despite the fact that he'd largely shut down his nerves, the pain was horrific. Yet he endured.

  Pushing close, Remo grabbed on to either side of the sparking chest hole. Wrenching hard, he tore the incision into a two-foot-wide gash.

  As the flashing fireworks of sparks increased, Gordons seemed to recover. Backup systems booted up in remote locations, compensating for the damage Remo had caused. With renewed vigor all eight of the spider legs lashed out.

  Too late.

  Remo had already twisted around, propping his feet against the android's chest, soles pressed to either side of the sparking gash. Bracing one hand against the side of the rumbling tank, he gave a mighty shove.

  Out of his element and caught by surprise, Mr. Gordons spiraled down the length of the tank, catching the surge of flame from the boosters.

  The fire instantly flooded into the breach in his heat-resistant panels. Wires melted and circuitry turned to slag. His body stiffened, then went limp.

  Like an undersea comet and trailing eight legs, the burning android disappeared in the fiery slipstream.

  Remo didn't stay to watch him vanish. Kicking sharply, he launched himself back up the side of the tank. The instant his hands broke the surface, bony hands clutched on to both his wrists. He felt himself being lifted from the water with delicate urgency.

  The coolness of the eighty-degree air shocked him. As careful hands laid him down on the bucking surface of the tank, Remo shivered uncontrollably. Tender fingers wiped his eyes clear.

  He found himself staring up into the deeply concerned face of the Master of Sinanju. His mouth forming a grim frown, the old man inspected the mass of burned and blistered flesh that covered his pupil's body.

  With a splutter the boosters stopped firing. The tank below them shuddered, then stopped dead. Remo tried to push himself to his elbows. The struggle proved too much. "We have to-" he said weakly as he fell back to the tank's curved surface. "Check, Chiun. We have to make sure this time."

  "The machine matters not, my son," the old man said softly. "We must tend to your injuries."

  "I'm fine," Remo insisted. But he knew it was not true.

  His body was one big bum. A prickly rash of confusion swam through his brain. As the delirium grew, his vision blurred. Behind the kaleidoscopic swirl that was his teacher, he saw a shadow loom up out of the water.

  Chiun sensed the motion behind him. Standing sharply, the old man whirled.

  The fog had largely burned away, replaced by pockets of wispy steam that swirled across the surface of the water. And from that calming sea, the Virgil probe was clambering up the arced surface of the external shuttle tank.

  The machine was badly damaged. Droplets of hissing slag dripped from its ruptured belly. The legs were largely burned away. It crawled on stumps of melted metal.

  Chiun saw the thin wire trailing into the steaming water. It was the same technique Gordons had used to animate the various creatures in Maine.

  "You are not Mr. Gordons," the old Korean pronounced.

  The voice that answered was that of Gordons, filtered through the battered speaker of the probe. "No," replied the voice that spoke through the Virgil probe. "I have been damaged. But I will repair myself."

  Lying on his back behind the Master of Sinanju, Remo had been squinting at the probe. As he watched, he realized that his eyes had been injured more than he thought, for a black haze suddenly began to swirl before him.

  He tried to blink the illusion away, but it only intensified. And as he watched in stunned silence, the swirl of black brightened and congealed. Remo found himself staring up into a pair of disturbingly familiar eyes.

  The otherworldly
figure who had appeared above him was only four feet tall with shiny black hair. Remo recognized the moon face of the Korean child. It was Song, the ghost of Chiun's dead son. The same boy who had appeared to Remo more than a year before to warn him of the hardships he would face. But there had been more than just that to his prophesying.

  At first Remo wasn't sure if the ghost he was looking at was real or if it was just a vision caused by his delirium.

  But then the boy nodded.

  And in that moment, Remo understood. Truly understood. The knowledge flooded his mind and heart, and he knew with all his being that it was right.

  Song offered a childlike smile and was gone. With calm acceptance Remo dropped his head back to the dock.

  Unmindful of the importance of what had just occurred behind him, the Master of Sinanju continued to face down Mr. Gordons's emissary.

  "I am a survival machine," the probe was saying. "I will do whatever is necessary to maximize my survival."

  "And we will do whatever is necessary to minimize it," the Master of Sinanju replied.

  If Gordons wanted to say more, Chiun didn't give him a chance. Bending, he snipped the wire with a single nail. A nudge from his sandal sent the Virgil probe back into the water. It hit with a mighty splash, sinking from sight.

  The instant he did so, the distant sound of an outboard motor carried to his shell-like ears.

  Far off on the bobbing waves of the Atlantic, a small motorboat raced away. Chiun noted that the boat moved at speeds far greater than it should have been able to achieve. In a matter of seconds it had disappeared from sight.

  His face tight, the old man spun back around. When he returned to Remo's side, the Master of Sinanju was surprised to find a smile on his pupil's burned and chapped lips. Chiun's frown deepened. "We must tend your wounds," the old Korean said, gently tucking his hands beneath his pupil.

  As he lifted Remo into the air, the smile never left the younger man's lips.

  The hint of sadness that might have flicked across Remo's eyes as he looked up at the old man's face, was supplanted by a sense of honor, pride and tradition.

  "It's time, Chiun," Remo said. And the words felt right.

  The Master of Sinanju didn't have time to ask what his pupil meant. Fatigue and injury took firm hold, and Remo faded into the soothing oblivion of peaceful slumber.

  Chapter 32

  When the ambulance passed through the gates of Folcroft Sanitarium three days later, Harold W. Smith and Mark Howard were waiting on the broad front steps.

  On opening the rear door, the ambulance attendants were surprised to see their patient not strapped to his gurney.

  Remo stepped down to the gravel drive. The Master of Sinanju flounced down after him.

  Thanks to Chiun's ministrations, the younger Master of Sinanju had made great progress on the road to recovery. His skin was still a bright crimson, but the blisters were drying and beginning to scab over. He looked exhausted.

  Smith's face was grave. Howard's expression mirrored that of his employer.

  "Stop looking like this is a wake," Remo groused at them. "I'm fine."

  "No, he is not," Chiun chimed in. "He is better, thanks to my expert care, but he still needs time to recuperate."

  Smith turned to Howard. "Mark, summon two orderlies and a gurney."

  "Do it and they're the ones who'll need a stretcher," Remo warned. "I just wanna go lie down."

  His lips thinning, Smith nodded tightly. Dismissing the ambulance attendants, the four men made their way into the building. Only when they were in the common room of Remo and Chiun's quarters, the door closed tightly behind them, did Smith feel free to speak.

  "What of Gordons?" the CURE director asked. Remo had sunk into a living-room chair. Smith and Howard were on the sofa while Chiun sat on the floor.

  "Didn't Chiun tell you?" Remo asked.

  Smith glanced at the old man. "Given his concern for you and your injuries, Master Chiun was, er, vague on the details," he said tactfully.

  "Only detail you need to know is that he got away," Remo said. "Good news is it looks like he shed that cockamamie probe thing, so we might not be seeing spider-Gordons again. But he's still out there somewhere."

  Smith clearly wasn't happy with this news. "Very well," he said with a troubled frown. "I suppose we shall have to satisfy ourselves with the fact that you survived your encounter with him."

  "Don't sound so disappointed," Remo droned.

  Smith forged ahead. "In case you did not hear while you were recovering, the truth of what Zipp Codwin was up to at NASA has come to light. It turns out that he spent the bulk of the agency's budget on everything but scientific research. It is mismanagement on a grand scale. Given his reputation and all that has come to light in the last thirty-six hours, it has been accepted by all that Codwin and his soldiers were to blame for everything odd that has happened there these past few days. So that is that." He stood to go.

  "Wait, what about that crackpot writer?" Remo asked. "You want me and Chiun to punch his ticket?"

  The Master of Sinanju was quick to chime in. "Remo needs to remain here while he recovers. But I will gladly travel to the Potato Province, Emperor."

  Remo noted the cunning in his tone. "You're not going house shopping without me, Little Father," he warned.

  The aged Korean raised an eyebrow. "Who said anything about shopping?" he sniffed. "If it is Emperor Smith's wish, that scribbler's home will soon be vacant."

  "I am absolutely not living in Stewart McQueen's house of horrors," Remo said firmly.

  "No, you are not," echoed Smith. "While his involvement in this is bothersome, we have decided to leave him alone."

  "We?" Remo asked. He turned a dull eye on Howard.

  For the first time the young man didn't squirm under Remo's glare. A calm certainty seemed to have descended on the assistant CURE director. He was looking beyond Remo, past the kitchenette to the two bedroom doors.

  "It would be too high profile," Smith insisted. "Especially so soon after Barrabas Anson."

  "Plus Stewart McQueen's become his old prolific self again," Mark Howard interjected. "I read this morning he's got three books coming out in the next three weeks. As a hot property again, it's too risky to connect him to CURE."

  Remo only shook his head. "Whatever," he sighed.

  "You should rest," Smith said. "I will be in my office. Remo, Master Chiun."

  "I'll catch up, Dr. Smith," Mark said as the older man stepped out into the hallway.

  Howard waited on the sofa as Remo climbed to his feet. Remo said not a word to the assistant CURE director as he walked over to his bedroom door.

  Given all that had happened these past few days, Remo had forgotten all about the articles he had stuck to his wall. He remembered the instant he switched on the light.

  Every last newspaper and magazine article was gone. The wallboard was riddled with tiny pinholes. The multicolored thumbtacks had been left in a big glass jar on his bureau.

  "What the hell did you do in here?" Remo demanded.

  Howard's face was flushed as he screwed up his courage. Rising to his feet, he crossed over to Remo's door. He glanced around the empty bedroom walls.

  "I burned everything in the furnace," Howard said. He still seemed somewhat intimidated by Remo, yet he held his ground. "I know what you were trying to do," he quickly added. "You wanted to spook me into thinking you're some kind of serial killer. But I'm not stupid, Remo, no matter what you think. You said it yourself. You're an assassin, not a killer. I know now there's a difference. And I'd really appreciate it if in the future you'd refrain from pulling this kind of childish crap again."

  There was relief on his face for having spoken the rehearsed words. With a tight nod to the Master of Sinanju, the red-faced young man left the room.

  "Well, what do you know," Remo said after the door clicked shut. "I actually hate him even more." He went into the bedroom. Kicking off his shoes, he sank to his sleeping mat. He was
reaching up for the light on the nightstand when he noted a silent presence across the room. When he glanced over, he found the Master of Sinanju framed in the doorway. The old man wore a somber expression.

  "I have been meaning to ask you something," Chiun said quietly. "After I dealt with the machineman's surrogate, you said something before you lost consciousness."

  "Oh, yeah," Remo said. "That." He fell silent.

  Chiun waited for his pupil to fill the pause. When Remo didn't, the old man persisted.

  "You said that it was time."

  Remo felt his shoulders slump. It had to be said. And yet it would change everything.

  "It is," he began. "It's just that ...well ...it's hard, that's all." He closed his eyes. Maybe if he didn't look at Chiun it would be easier. "It's time ...for me to be more than just Apprentice Reigning Master." The words were too important to blurt out. Yet speaking them quickly would make it so much easier. "You are the Master who trained me and made me more than anything I deserve to be, and you're also my father and I love you more than anything else on the planet, but the feeling is there and I know that it's right. It hit me back in Florida and I've been afraid to say it these past three days, and it doesn't mean that I don't respect you or want you around anymore, because I think I'll need you more than ever before, but it's time that I take the last step-" he took a deep breath "-and assumed the title of Reigning Master." His eyes still squeezed tightly shut, he winced, waiting for the shoe to drop.

  There was a moment of silence during which he expected something to happen. He figured it would mostly involve yelling. But there was no yelling. Just a thoughtful exhale of air. When Chiun spoke, his voice was calm.

  "Well, it is about time," the Master of Sinanju said.

  Stunned, Remo opened one careful eye.

  Chiun still stood in the doorway. There was a knowing look on the old man's face. His hazel eyes twinkled.

  Remo thought he'd been ready for any reaction. But this one came as a surprise. "Huh?" he said.