Brain Storm

9

Chiun let the phone ring precisely one hundred times.

He didn't wish to appear too eager to perform such a menial chore.

In any other kingdom, at any other time during the nearly five-thousand-year history of the House of Sinanju, an indentured servant would have been placed at the disposal of the Master of Sinanju. This servant's duties would have been varied. Among them would be drawing the Master's bath, laundering the Master's robes, and now—in the twentieth century, on the distant shores of the United States of America—answering the Master's telephone.

Since the crazed Emperor Smith, the true though secretive ruler of America, didn't wish for Chiun to have servants, the duty of answering the telephone generally fell to Remo.

But Remo wasn't there.

Remo had allowed the device to squawk more than sixty times earlier in the day. Chiun couldn't allow himself to appear more eager than his pupil, so he had decided that the perfect number, one hundred, would be the one on which he answered the ringing apparatus.

"I am Chiun," he announced into the phone.

"Chiun, I need you at Folcroft."

Smith was usually more formal on the telephone, electing to use Chiun's title rather than his name.

Chiun preferred the formality.

"Remo is on his way, O Emperor," Chiun declared.

"There is a problem with Remo."

"He is missing?"

"No, no. He arrived here but...it would be better, perhaps, for me to show you rather than explain it over the telephone."

"You wish to show me something?"

"Yes."

Chiun tipped his head, considering. "You will hire me a conveyance?"

"A cab will be there to pick you up shortly. I have reserved you a seat on a 6:00 p.m. flight out of Logan."

"Very well."

Chiun hung up the phone.

Smith had something to show him. What could it be but the autograph? Doubtless the fool felt his name was too valuable to entrust the signature to Remo.

It had better be. Especially with all of the aggra-vation Chiun was going through to collect it.

Like a fussy hen, Chiun hurried around the house preparing for the trip.

Ten minutes later Chiun was in a cab on the way to the airport.

The driver was a sixtyish man with a crown of steel gray hair and a thick, wrinkled neck.

As they drove, Chiun complained loudly about Smith. He was upset at the CURE director's short-sightedness in not asking him to accompany Remo this morning. At least then he would have had someone to complain to along the way. He also griped about Remo, a boy so dim he couldn't be trusted to carry out a simple errand.

"Tell me about it," the cabbie commiserated. "I got a kid. A son, too. Ten years out of college and still living at home. I tell the wife we should just toss him out on his ear. But, you know, he's his mama's boy. She says I'll go before he does."

"Pardon me," Chiun said. "Was someone speaking to you?"

The cabdriver shrugged. "I thought you were," he said. There wasn't a hint of malice in his voice. He was used to the rapid mood swings of fares.

"I am put through all of this for a simple autograph," Chiun said to the window. "A thing that could be sent to me by post."

"I wouldn't do that," the cabdriver cautioned.

"My kid's got an autographed Willie Mays card.

You know, from back when he was playing. It's worth a bundle right about now. You tell me, is it normal for a thirty-year-old to pay a couple hundred bucks for a bubble-gum card?"

And because he didn't wish to hear someone griping all the way to the airport, Chiun touched the man lightly on the side of the neck.

Immediately the cabbie's vocal cords seized up.

The rest of the trip to the airport was blessedly quiet.

It was dark by the time Chiun arrived at Folcroft.

As he made his way across the tree-dotted lawns surrounding the sanitarium, he could see a few late-evening boaters chugging across the gently rippling waters of Long Island Sound. The lights on the craft bobbed hypnotically above the undulating black surface.

He spied a young blond man standing alertly beside a large white van parked at the apex of the long gravel driveway. He avoided the man, as well as the truck, and merged with the pervasive darkness surrounding the ivy-covered building, a shadow among shadows.

The side door was locked this late at night. Chiun wrapped his delicate fingers around the handle and wrenched. The hooked piece of shiny aluminum bent but stayed attached to the thick metal fire door.

The bolt dropped free of the latch and clanged into the damp inner stairwell.

Chiun entered the building.

The sanitarium was lightly staffed at this hour, and a cost-cutting measure instituted by Smith had dropped the ambient light within the corridors and stairwells to near nothing.

The Master of Sinanju became as one with the gloom as he moved through the empty administrative wing of the sanitarium.

He found Smith's office and, ignoring his suprasensory data that told him there were three men inside—one obviously Remo, another obviously Smith—Chiun pushed open the doorway and entered the sparse room.

"Emperor Smith, the House of Sinanju expresses gratitude to you, its benefactor, for that which you are about to bestow. All hail—"

He was halfway through his speech when he noticed Lothar Holz beside Smith's desk. The man had been sitting, but stood when Chiun entered.

Chiun's eyes grew as wide as joyful saucers. "You have brought with you your costar," Chiun said delightedly.

"Master Chiun, you must dispatch this man at once," Smith ordered abruptly.

Surprised, Holz glanced from the aged Asian at the door back to Smith.

"Master?" he said. His eyes strayed to Remo, who stood stock-still beside Smith's desk, a glint of impotent fury dancing in the depths of his deep-set eyes.

Chiun nodded sagely. "I have heard of such problems on television sets before. Do not fret, Emperor Smith, for this was merely the pilot episode. Surely your role will be expanded in the future."

Chiun suddenly felt something brush against the base of his skull. It was a slight tickle. The sensation intensified and moved around behind his ears. Chiun waved a long-nailed hand beside his head as if swatting away a pesky fly. Although he felt the unmis-takable hum, he didn't sense the disruption of air an insect would cause.

"Chiun, quickly!" Smith called urgently.

"This is the true Master of Sinanju." It was a statement of fact. Holz unfurled a delicate finger in Chiun's direction. "Curt, get a lock on the old one."

Chiun was torn. Though his emperor was directly ordering him to destroy Lothar Holz, star of the evening news, he was momentarily distracted by the strange sensation creeping across the back of his egg-shell skull.

But it was no more than that. A sensation.

And as quickly as the sensation had come, it passed.

Confusion clouded the cobweb wrinkles above his eyes.

Chiun took a step into the room...and was blocked by Remo.

The younger man had become suddenly animated.

He had gone from being a motionless statue one moment to a springing tiger the next.

He leaped from his spot beside Smith's desk, landing softly in the center of the worn carpet.

Remo now stood protectively between the Master of Sinanju and Lothar Holz, barring Chiun's way.

Chiun's ancient eyes narrowed to curious slivers.

"Remove yourself."

Remo said nothing. There was no malice in his deep-set eyes.

In fact, there was something closer to sadness. And fear.

"Remo is not himself," Smith insisted. "He is being manipulated."

"Do not be a fool, Smith," Chiun spat. He started to slide to Remo's left, but a thick-wristed hand shot out, blocking his path. It wasn't a threatening move, by any stretch of the imagination. But it was aggressive nonetheless. Remo was barring the Master of Sinanju from performing a duty to his emperor.

Chiun dodged right, but Remo's other arm shot out, faster than either Smith or Holz could follow.

Both arms were stretched out now, like a Hollywood zombie's, with Chiun standing between them.

"Curt, what's going on?" Holz demanded of the air. "Get the old man under control." He tapped the small receiver in his ear.

"Remo, step aside," Chiun said, under his breath.

And rather than move, Remo's hand lashed out viciously, in a direct line for Chiun's temple.

So shocked was Chiun by the unexpected attack that the blow very nearly registered.

The old man dropped low and feinted left, beneath Remo's deadly fist, and came up behind him, his back to Smith's desk. Remo spun a perfect pirouette in midair and landed facing Chiun.

To Smith and Holz, it appeared as if Remo's response were instantaneous, but Chiun saw that it was sluggish. It didn't have any of the normal fluidity or grace Chiun had come to expect from Remo's usual movements.

"Remo, what is this?" the Master of Sinanju demanded, his mouth a furious, questioning O.

He again saw the strange look buried deep within his pupil's usually expressionless eyes. Something that registered deep regret and deeper sorrow. Remo threw another blow at Chiun.

The Master of Sinanju swatted it aside as if it were nothing. But he could see that Remo was becoming more focused in his attacks. It was as if whatever was controlling his actions was growing more adept with each subsequent move.

"Chiun, Remo is under some kind of mind control. His actions are not his own," Smith cried Pleadingly. "Holz is behind it." With a gnarled gray index finger, he indicated the man Chiun had seen on television with Smith the previous day.

Holz was tapping at the tiny object in his ear, not even paying attention to the battle being waged in the center of the office.

Remo attacked Chiun once more. It was more complex than his previous attempts and it very nearly worked. The Master of Sinanju had to duck away before he was able to join in the motion of the blow.

He grabbed Remo by the wrist and, as the arm swung around, he moved the rest of the body along with it.

They were like two dancers executing a simple rou-tine, but when they were finished, Remo was facing away from the rear of the office, toward the open door.

Chiun swatted Remo on the back.

The contact of the flat of Chiun's bony hand against Remo's spine sent the young man sprawling across the floor. It wasn't a lethal blow, but one meant merely to stun. The most fundamental aspect of Sinanju was breathing, and Chiun had effectively robbed Remo's lungs of breath. It would be a moment before he would recover.

The itching at the base of his skull resumed, but Chiun ignored it.

He whirled up to Lothar Holz, a vengeful dervish, and plucked the small transceiver from his ear.

"Is this the device that robs my son's will?" He crushed the hearing aid in his wrinkled hand.

A movement. The press of rapid air. Too fast to move out of the way.

Chiun suddenly felt a great pressure against his back.

The blow was flawed. It didn't kill, nor did it rob him of air.

But it should not have landed.

Pipe-stem legs swung windmill fashion while arms fought for balance. Chiun felt himself going up and over Smith's desk.

Some air was lost. He opened his nose and mouth to pull in more oxygen even as he twisted in midair.

He landed behind Smith's desk, catlike, on his sandaled feet.

Remo should not have recovered that quickly. The Master of Sinanju could see the strain on his pupil's face. As if his body was being forced to perform in spite of the damage it could cause him.

Smith stood beside Chiun, his gaunt face stunned.

He hadn't even seen Remo move. The young man had gone from a prone position on the floor to an upright posture in a fraction of a second.

Holz had moved in behind Remo. Like a taunting third-grader protected by the shadow of a schoolyard bully.

And in the face of an unknown enemy that could rob a man of his spirit and force him to attack the one to whom he was most indebted, Chiun did the only thing he felt he could do.

Wordlessly the Master of Sinanju plucked Smith from behind his desk. He spirited the protesting CURE director past Remo, into the outer office. Seconds later they were across the lawns and over the walls of Folcroft, beyond the range of the Dynamic Interface System signal.

When they were gone, the engine of the white van with the fancy PlattDeutsche insignia continued to purr quietly into the warm late-spring night.