Before Chatto could issue a command that would grab their attention, his men were finished. The last one to die was Steve, the one who insisted they call him by his SEAL nickname, Scorpion. Scorpion was kneeling outside the bedroom with his eyes wide, his trousers soiled and his throat showing a tiny red cut encircling it.
Steve the Scorpion had to have died in a state of nearly perfect balance, but when he finally fell over his head rolled right off and came to a halt at Chatto's feet.
"Who are you guys?" Chatto demanded, surprised to find just two attackers in the hall.
"I'm the karate kid, and that's Miyagi," said the slender figure.
"Pah!" answered the tiny Asian.
"Old man, you broke my fucking wrist," Chatto said, waving the mini-Uzi threateningly at the pair.
"Had I known what you did with it, I would have broken something else."
Chatto knew there was something wrong here, but he couldn't figure out what it was. The two in the expansive landing didn't seem to care that they had a submachine gun targeting their guts. The little Asian was an inscrutable mass of wrinkles in the dim light. He had
his hands in the sleeves of his geisha dress, for crying out loud. The taller man...
Chatto couldn't see his face, really, but somehow he could see the eyes. It was like he was looking at pinpricks of death light.
Who were they? Were they even human? Because Chatto had seen them in action and it wasn't normal.
"Answer the question!"
"What was the question again?" asked the man with the dead eyes.
"Who are you!"
"I'm James. He's Jinx."
"What is Jinx?" the little Asian demanded of the tall dark figure.
"Shut the fuck up!" Chatto shouted. He hurt like hell. "One more smart-ass answer, and I'm gonna make somebody into dog meat."
'It is possible Remo would make acceptable dog meat," the Asian said. "He has certainly proved to be without value in most other capacities."
"And it's true you wouldn't make an appetizer fit for a Chihuahua," the tall man said, to Chatto's dismay. His world had made sense until about ninety seconds ago.
"You pieces of shit—"
"Not going well, is it, buddy?" the tall man asked sympathetically, stepping up and taking the mini-Uzi out of Chatto's hands so easily and casually that Chatto had to make a real effort to be surprised. He was even
more surprised when he saw that the mini-Uzi he had threatened them with had a corkscrew barrel. Now when had that happened?
"So, what's up? What's going on? Why're you here? You fans of the senator?"
The dark figure nodded at the bedroom, where Chatto heard the baritone sobbing of the senator and the comforting murmurs of the cheerleader.
"I'm not telling you—"
"Yeah, heard it a million times," the tall figure said. "And then I go like this—" Chatto felt his earlobe get pinched "—and then you go like this, 'Ouch ouch please stop I'll tell you everything ouch ouch'."
And that's exactly how it happened.
23
"He couldn't tell us a thing, Smitty, except that Serval and Jomarca were definitely their big targets in the area. The other targets were little and middle-sized fish in the greater Topeka area," Remo reported from a phone booth on a street corner in a more urban part of town. "Who would have thought there was so much corruption in Topeka?"
"That's irrelevant now, with the cell destroyed," Smith said.
"I mean, half the elected officials in this state spend their free time with hookers and/or attending white-supremacist organization meetings."
"It doesn't matter, Remo," Dr. Smith insisted. "You neutralized the cell. Those people are no longer targets."
"Get this, Smitty, the majority leader in the state senate? He's a compulsive shoplifter! And he steals nothing except frozen meat!"
"Remo, please."
"Hey, don't get mad at me, I'm not making this shit up."
"I don't care! Can we please address matters of importance?"
"Yeah. Sure. But you won't top my frozen-meat story."
Mark Howard was watching his map of the United States of America and feeling despondent.
So many electronic dots. Each one indicated corruption of one kind or another among the public officials. And there were hundreds of dots.
Some were as minor as the doughnut-eater in Chicago, while others were vast and sophisticated systems of extortion or theft that involved many people, including some of the highest ranking tax-paid personnel.
This was not some Third World nation where payoffs were a part of the culture, where graft was simply standard operating procedure, where politicians were underpaid to the point where they had no choice but to take bribes to survive.
This was America, one of the world's richest nations. Where politicians were supposedly accountable to the voters.
So why was there so much underhandedness? Was it all for money? Was it all for power? Did power always result in corruption, as the old cliché said?
No, he knew that wasn't true. He had delved into many of these accusations and found that many were just that—accusations, without foundation. The targets weren't necessarily guilty, but there had to have been some publicity that led the population to believe they might be.
For the most part, the murder victims had been shown, after they died, to have in fact been guilty of their crimes, but without more intense scrutiny, they couldn't be absolutely sure that the evidence was genuine. And they didn't have time for that now.
All they had time to do was sit and sift through the hundreds of potential targets and look for the likeliest first strikes—or wait for the Folcroft Four to point out a strike as it occurred.
Mark Howard heard the tiny electronic tone that brought his attention to the map again, where one of the red lights was blinking. He began pounding commands into the keyboard, brought up the details and snatched at the phone.
"Mark here," he said, knowing Dr. Smith was on the line with Remo. "Sorry to interrupt. We've got a flagged incident in San Francisco."
"I see it," Dr. Smith responded quickly, bringing up Mark's quickly organized window of data about the event. He would see it on his own screen just as Mark did—and see the possible implications of the attack. If it was an attack. "Remo, I'm ordering an Air Force transport for you. How soon can you get to the airport?"
"Like I know," Remo responded. "I have no clue where it even is. You tell me, Smitty."
There was a moment of furious keystrokes, then Smith announced, "Twenty minutes from where you are now if you find immediate transport."
"Should I find immediate transport?"
"We need you in California as fast as possible, Remo, if we're going to stop further attacks."
"I'll get a cab. Here, Chiun wants to talk to you."
Mark was barely listening as he read the details of the first attack. The indications of corruption for San Francisco were many and tightly spaced. How in the world were they going to pick out the likely next target? It could be any of them.
"Dr. Smith. Prince Howard." It was Master Chiun, using his most melodious voice, which was usually reserved for preparing them for the asking of special favors.
"Master Chiun," Dr. Smith said brusquely, "there is no time to talk now. You and Remo must get to California immediately."
"I understand many important events are afoot, Emperor," Chiun practically sang. "But there is a matter equally important of which we must speak."
"No time now, Master Chiun," Dr. Smith insisted.
"Ah, but now is the optimal time," Chiun replied, but the beautiful, songlike quality of his demurring voice was shattered by a raucous mechanical screech.
"What in the lord's name was that?" Dr. Smith asked.