Remo moved in slow motion as far as Skinhead or the old man could tell, but the knife wasn't even out of its leather sheath before Remo took hold of the forearm that was grabbing for it. He bent the forearm, but it wasn't the wrist that turned at right angles suddenly-it was the forearm itself, and that required a lot of bone breaking to accomplish. Remo didn't mind putting out the little bit of extra effort.
Skinhead minded. The bellow that came out of him was extraordinary.
"Hey, hey, hey," Remo said as he pinched Skinhead behind the neck in a fashion similar to Long Hair; this made the bellow stop. "People will think you're a foghorn-you want to screw up shipping traffic from here to Key West?"
"What are you doing here?" Ethan Humphrey demanded.
"First things first," Remo said. "Do we or do we not need Dumb and Dumber to make the trip to the pirate island?"
"Wha-what?" Humphrey asked. "Pirate island?"
"They know where the pirate island is," Remo said matter-of-factly. "Don't you, boys?"
In torment, Skinhead and Long Hair still managed to produce vigorous nods of assent.
"If they can get me there, I'll keep them. Instead of you," Remo said. "Got the picture?"
"I get it," Humphrey said miserably.
"You take me where I need to go, and you just might survive," said Remo, "but you don't have tons of time to think about it. Tick-tock, Dr. Humphrey. Sink or swim."
"I'll take you." Humphrey hung his head.
"Good. Sorry, boys."
He lifted the pair of cutthroats and brought them together violently, shattering their bones and pulverizing their softer parts. What remained was fused into a mass of flesh and seeping blood. Remo heaved it into the water before it started to drip on the deck.
Humphrey was staring at Remo, aghast, as he turned back from the rail. "You ...you...killed him!" the professor stammered.
"I didn't check pulses but, yeah, I'm pretty sure dead is what they are," Remo asked.
"I'm to be next, I suppose?"
"Well, that depends on you."
"Excuse me?" Humphrey seemed confused.
Chapter 15
"Excuse me?"
"You're surprised," the man named Kidd responded. "Certainly, I understand how you must feel."
"I doubt that very much."
They were alone inside the squalid hut that served as Stacy's prison cell. The other three young women had been sent outside when he arrived demanding privacy. At first Stacy feared she was about to be assaulted, but the truth was even more bizarre, more frightening.
The pirate captain was proposing marriage.
No, that wasn't right. He wasn't asking her to marry him. Rather, he was informing her of his decision, standing back and smiling at her with his yellow teeth, as if she ought to be delighted by the news. He plainly viewed the prospect of their marriage as an honor that should be apparent to the most thickheaded woman on the planet.
"Married?" She repeated it as if the word were foreign to her, not a part of her vocabulary.
"That's the ticket," Kidd replied, still beaming at her with discolored teeth. "You're prob'ly wondering about the service."
"Well-"
"I grant you, we don't have a rightful preacher," he continued, "but we have our differences with Mother Church."
"I can imagine," Stacy said.
Kidd chuckled to himself, appreciating her wit, but it was artificial, like stage laughter, there and gone. He still had more to say, and while he hadn't exactly rehearsed the speech, he still seemed bent on making certain points.
"The good news," Kidd continued, "is that I'm the captain of this scurvy lot, and maritime law gives me the authority to pronounce nuptials."
"So, you can marry yourself?"
Kidd blinked at that idea, as if confused, then frowned slightly. "Perform the rights, you mean? Of course. I grant you, it may not be strictly legal on the mainland, but I've long since given up on courting the opinion of landlubbers."
"This is so sudden," Stacy said. It was the ultimate cliche, but she could think of nothing else to say. Her mind was racing, jumbled thoughts colliding, jostling one another, but she had a feeling that it would be foolish-maybe even fatal-to show weakness in the presence of this man.
"You'll get used to the notion," Kidd replied, "once we've been rightly hitched. You'll be my queen."
The final comment was so serious that Stacy almost laughed out loud. She bit her tongue instead and stood with eyes downcast, considering the best response.
"What sort of an engagement period were you considering?" she asked at last.
"Engagement?" Once again Kidd seemed confused. "To hell with that nonsense! Tonight's the night, my love. Your Chinky friend's already working on the menu."
"He's Korean," Stacy said, stalling for time.
"It's all the same," Kidd said. "You rest now. Get yourself shipshape for the big event."
"I don't have anything to wear!" she blurted out, the sheer absurdity of it all twitching the corners of her mouth into a near-hysterical smile that could just as easily have been a rictus of pain.
"No matter," Kidd replied. "We'll fix you up with something for the ceremony. Later on, of course, you won't need anything to wear."
He left her with a wink and leer in parting. Stacy stared after him until she was alone and fairly certain he wouldn't duck back to add some new announcement. She stiffened at the sound of shuffling footsteps, but it was her fellow captives returning. Megan came forward, while Robin and Felicia hung back, near the curtained entrance to the hut.
"I hear we're going to be bridesmaids," Megan said.
At that, a dam burst inside Stacy, and she stepped into the younger woman's arms, dissolving into tears.
CHIUN WAS WORKING ON A culinary masterpiece. It was to be a wedding feast, as he had been informed, and the ridiculous young men who thought he was their prisoner demanded "something special for the bride and groom."
Chiun intended to oblige.
The one-eyed cretin charged with guarding Chiun lurched to his feet as the Master Emeritus of Sinanju approached. "Need sumpthin', Chinaman?"
Chiun considered pulling off the pirate's arm and using it to rearrange his grubby features. It would be so easy. Once that simple chore was done, he could proceed to take the others as they came, one at a time, or in whatever combinations they preferred. There were no more than sixty-five or seventy in all. It would be child's play. If not for the prisoners. Surely the rabble would resort to using hostages once it became apparent that they were being picked off by an invisible killer.
How important, he wondered for the tenth time, were the prisoners, really?
Important enough to Emperor Smith, Chiun decided. He would be upset. As would Remo-and the bigmouthed boy would never let the subject rest. He would go on and on for weeks. Chiun would be in misery. He sighed mentally. He would have to wait. But the waiting wouldn't be wasted time.
"Your captain wants a special feast," Chiun said, making his voice higher and slightly squeaky.
"Our cap'n?" parroted the goon behind the crusty eye patch.
"As I said." Chiun could be obsequious when circumstances called for it, though it would never cease to gall him. "I require some spices."
"We got salt," said the pirate, swinging at the single wooden shelf in the cooking sty. "And we got pepper."
"Not enough," Chiun replied, gesturing toward the forest that surrounded the encampment. "I must go and look for other things."
"Like hell," the pirate snarled. "Nobody tole me nothin' 'bout you leavin' camp. Forget about it, Slant-eyes."
This time, Chiun imagined reaching deep inside the pirate's chest and ripping out the withered lump of gristle that sufficed him for a heart. Perhaps, on second thought, it would be more instructive to crack open his skull and examine the tiny husk of his brain.
Both prospects made Chiun smile, an uncharacteristic expression on his ancient face, but the pirate didn't know him well enough to realize that death was near.