At his console Bob Beasley swallowed hard.
"And here come my trusty musketeers," said Uncle Sam.
REMO WILLIAMS SENSED the footfalls of the approaching men. He counted six sets of feet.
They came around a bend in the corridor carefully, their hearts beating hard but not in the high pounding of a preattack rhythm. There was no residual gunpowder smell, so they carried no weapons Remo needed to worry about.
"Out of my way and nobody gets hurt," warned Remo, advancing on them.
"You looking for Uncle Sam Beasley?" a voice asked.
"That's right."
"Three doors down," said the voice.
"On the right," added another.
"Can't miss it," said a third.
"Who are you?"
"Ex-employees of the Sam Beasley Corporation."
"Since when?"
"Since we gave him up just now."
"How do I know it's not a trap?" asked Remo.
"We're supposed to lure you into a trap."
"What trap?"
"LOX room. Liquid oxygen. It's all the way at the end of the corridor."
"You guys are pretty free with information."
"You would be, too, if you worked for these cold corporate ducksuckers."
"Much obliged," said Remo, passing on.
"TRAITORS!" Sam Beasley screamed, stamping the floor with his stainless-steel peg leg. "What's wrong with them? I'm Uncle Sam. I practically raised those ungrateful brats!"
"They've been pretty unhappy since you froze cost-of-living raises companywide," Bob Beasley noted.
"Then why did they come all the way over here if they weren't behind this damn operation?"
"You promised not to fire anyone who signed on."
Uncle Sam Beasley rolled his eye down to the back of the head of his nephew. Stainless-steel fingers whirring, he snared a fistful of hair and yanked the head back sharply so he could glare down into Bob Beasley's upside-down face.
"Whose side are you on?"
"Yours, Uncle. You know that."
"Prove it."
"How?"
"You look a lot like me, you lucky stiff. You decoy him into the LOX room."
"But-but-"
Uncle Sam released the hair. "Do it!"
Shivering, Bob Beasley climbed out of his chair and backed out of the control room. "I won't fail you, Uncle."
"Not if you don't want those bratty kids of yours served up as cold cuts at the next company picnic."
The door opened and closed with a hiss, and Uncle Sam climbed into the seat his nephew had vacated.
"How's that control panel coming?" he snapped over his shoulder.
The hypercolor technician said, "I've raised orange."
"When you've got Supergreen, let me know. The French should be regrouping soon. I can't beat them back with pastels, you know."
"Yes, Director."
THE MASTER of SINANJU stepped up to a pounding heartbeat that blocked his path and aimed at the point where he knew the man's belly would be. The nail of his smallest finger went in like a needle into butter, and a disembodied voice said, "Urrk. "
The Master of Sinanju described the sign of Sinanju-a trapezoid bisected by a slash-in his abdominal wall and left the unseen foe lying in a heap of his own smoking bowels.
He moved on. The way to the castle was clear. He did not need anything other than the personal scent of his pupil to guide him.
But as he approached, a drone came from the north.
A nearby voice cried, "It is a bomber."
Chiun paused. "How do you know?"
"I know a French bomber when I see one," said Dominique Parillaud.
"What is it doing?"
"It can have only one purpose."
"Yes?"
"To bomb."
Then Dominique said, "Ze bomb bay doors are open. Somezing is coming down."
And the Master of Sinanju snared the wrist of the French woman agent and pulled her along.
"Hurry!"
"Are you mad? Zere is no escape."
And from above came a mushy poom of a sound that brought a squeal of fear from Dominique Parillaud's throat.
It was followed by a great fluttering as if a thousand origami wings had taken flight.
Chapter 31
Remo moved down the corridor blind, but every other sense operating at peak efficiency.
A figure popped out of the third door on the right, paused and ran deeper into Utilicanard. The door hissed shut.
A muffled voce said, "You'll never catch me." It sounded like Uncle Sam's voice.
Remo Williams heard the beating heart and laboring lungs and started after it.
But when Remo got to the door, he suddenly swerved and, holding the flat of his palm before him like a ram, broke it down.
The door screeched coming out of its grooves, and Remo was in.
There were two heartbeats, one fast and normal, the other unhurried, metronomic-the animatronic heart of Uncle Sam Beasley.
"Nice try," said Remo, facing the unnatural sound. "But no sale."
"I'm unarmed. I surrender peacefully," said Uncle Sam.
"It's not going to be that way."
"You're an American agent, right?"
"Right."
"So I'm surrendering to you. You have to take me alive."
"Who says?"
"It's the way the game is played. Don't kid me."
"Not my game," said Remo.
"What game is that?"
"Counterassassin."
"Counterassassin? What's a goddamn counterassassin doing on my trail?"
"For special cases, we drop the prefix," said Remo.
Uncle Sam switched to a wheedling, ingratiating voice. "You wouldn't kill your old Uncle Sam? First time we crossed paths, you were going to. But you couldn't, could you?"
"You should have stayed in that padded cell," Remo said, adjusting to each shift of his opponent's body so he blocked the door.
"You couldn't do it because you remember those long-ago Sunday nights squatting before the old TV in your pj's, watching my TV show. Watching me."
"Stuff it. You aren't that Uncle Sam anymore. He died when you should have."
"You're pretty brave behind that mask. There's no hypercolor laser units here. Let's see if you can look me in the eye before you do it."
"Sorry. No time."
"Coward."
"Don't call me that."
"Uncle Sam is calling you a coward. Are you a man or a little mousie?"
Remo hesitated. "I don't have time for games."
"I'm not afraid to look into your eyes. Why are you afraid to look into mine? Only have the one, you know."
"No sale," said Remo, stepping up in the welcome darkness to do the job he had to do.
A whirring warned of the steel hydraulic fist coming up, seeking Remo's mask, but it was too slow by weeks.
Zeroing in on the regular pumping of the animatronic heart, Remo drove the hard heel of his fist toward the sound.
Uncle Sam tried to block the blow. Remo felt the initial pressure wave. But Uncle Sam might as well have been trying to block a steam shovel with a plastic drinking straw.
"Punk! I raised you! I raised you better than your own parents. And you know it. You can't kill me! You wouldn't dare."
"Shut up! You don't know anything about my parents."
"I know they mistreated you. Admit it. They tanned your helpless butt and left you to cry your little eyes out. And when you thought no one loved you, I was there. Me and Mongo and Dingbat. And if we'd asked you to shoot your folks back then, you'd have done it. Because we molded your mind, just as we molded the little minds of every American generation since the Depression. You think you can kill me? Don't make me laugh. We're family."
In the darkness of his mind, Remo was silent for half a minute. Then in a low, barely contained voice, he said, "Thanks. You just made it easy for me."
Remo's palm drove out, smacking Uncle Sam once over the mechanical heart, and it gulped twice. And with a gurgle it ceased all function.
Uncle Sam shuddered on his feet, a long hiss coming out of his slack mouth. He fell back, struck the console and slid to the floor.