Unnatural Selection

There had been many more incidents throughout the afternoon. And the tristate area was no longer alone. There had been like occurrences in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. To Smith, the pattern indicated a product being shipped by ground. He had already come to this conclusion even before Remo had phoned back to suggest Lubec Springs bottled water was the source of contamination.

Smith's desk was an onyx slab set before the big picture window at the back of the office. Beneath its surface was a canted monitor, visible only to whoever sat at the desk. A keyboard at desk's edge only became visible when it sensed Smith's touch. Keys lit obedient amber flashes in response to his relentless drumming fingers.

He had been working for hours nonstop. All at once, Smith paused at his workstation.

The lines of amber text on his special monitor were beginning to blur again.

Blinking hard, he removed his rimless glasses. He massaged his eyes with the tips of his arthritic fingers. Looking to a point across the room, he tried to regain his focus.

The thing he stared at was a drab black-and-white photograph of Folcroft, taken some time in the 1950s. It had been hung in the office by the sanitarium's previous administrator.

Smith had never thought to take down the picture, never considered bringing in something of a more personal nature from home. The CURE director felt that any infusion of one's personality into a work area had the effect of making that area too comfortable. And comfort bred lax work habits.

Besides, Smith's office did reflect his personality. It was cold, humorless and Spartan. The room was a direct, if inadvertent, gaze into the soul of the gray old man in the gray three-piece suit who sat in isolation at the loneliest posting in all of America's intelligence services.

Smith's eyes began to clear. The young saplings in the photograph, which had grown into mighty shade trees during Smith's tenure at Folcroft, were starting to come into focus.

He replaced his glasses and was turning back to his keyboard when the door to his office unexpectedly burst open. Smith looked up with a concerned start.

"Hope you're decent," Remo announced as he strode into the room. Chiun swept in after him.

"He is that and more," the Master of Sinanju proclaimed, personally insulted by Remo's choice of words. "He is decent, kind and generous. Hail, Smith, guardian of the sacred Constitution." The Korean gave an informal bow before sweeping across the room.

At his desk, Smith was still recovering from his initial shock. He offered a hurried bow of his head. "Please shut the door," he said to Remo. "And I wish you would knock."

"And miss that look on your face?" Remo said, swinging the door shut. "By the way, if you want to look a little more guilty, why not try wearing a black mask and an I Violated The Constitution And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt shirt?"

As he crossed over to Smith's desk, he dug in the pocket of his chinos, pulling out an aspirin bottle. "A little present from Catwoman," he said, tossing the bottle to Smith.

The CURE director caught it with both hands. Liquid sloshed inside. "This is the police station sample you phoned about, I assume?" he queried dryly.

"Yep. We dumped the rest down the drain." Smith placed the bottle to one side of his desk. "We will test this if it becomes necessary. When you called, I sent Mark to my country club to collect samples there. They have been rushed off for analysis."

"The kid's not here?"

"I instructed him to remain at the lab conducting the tests. I wanted him on-site the instant there is news."

"The news is what Remo has already told you, Emperor," Chiun said. "The creatures that have twice vexed your kingdom have returned. Fortunately, with Sinanju as sword and shield, you need not fear any common jungle beasts."

Tucking his black robes around him, the Master of Sinanju sank to a lotus position in the center of the threadbare carpet.

"Yeah, go-go team," Remo said. "In the meantime, you've put a stop to the Lubec Springs shipments. So once you have all the stuff that's been shipped recalled, I guess we won't have to worry about any more of those things."

A troubled frown crossed the CURE director's face.

"You did have this stuff recalled, right, Smitty?"

"I have not," Smith replied tightly.

Remo's face darkened. "Why the hell not? In case you haven't heard, we've got Daktari breaking out on Main Street, U.S.A. and there's a run on safari jackets at Banana Republic. You've got to cut them off. While you do that, Chiun and I will go to that bottling place in Maine and pull White's plug."

"You can't," Smith insisted. "Not yet." He leaned back in his chair. "Remo, the nature of this crisis dictates caution. If Lubec Springs is alone in this, then we can focus on them alone. But if the contamination has reached other bottlers, then whoever is behind this could be anywhere. By focusing on Lubec Springs before we know all the facts, we could be alerting Judith White or whoever is responsible. We can't afford to tip our hand too early."

"You're just gonna let people keep drinking that junk?"

"Through CURE's facilities I have given an order ostensibly from the FDA. A new federal mandate now requires a forty-eight-hour waiting period before retailers can sell bottled water. This to allow for settlement of particulates. Given the relatively low number of cases so far, I would imagine that most outlets have not yet reached the contaminated shipments. They must yet have back stock to go through. With any luck, this should buy us the time we need to track down and eliminate whoever is behind this."

"We know who it is, Smitty," Remo said. "By dicking around down here, you're giving White time to get away."

"Quite the opposite," Smith insisted. "To err on the side of caution now should narrow her avenue of escape, assuming we learn that Lubec Springs is the only source of the genetic tampering. If we discover that this is the case, we will know precisely where to send you. You and Chiun may deal with Dr. White once and for all. If, indeed, it is her."

Remo leaned on the edge of Smith's wide desk. "I thought I dealt with her last time," he mumbled bitterly.

"An error that cannot be blamed on Sinanju," Chiun quickly pointed out from the floor. "For the cape in which it has cloaked itself is that of Man. We did not know then that the beast Remo battled had perverted nature by granting itself nine lives. We took but one before. This time, we will do away with the remaining eight."

"Just one of her was plenty tough, Little Father," Remo said. "I don't like the idea of a lion's den filled with eight Judith Whites. Even Daniel didn't have to put up with that."

Chiun shook his head angrily. His wisps of yellowing white hair danced above his ears. "Stop mentioning that troublesome wizard," he hissed.

Remo raised an eyebrow at the edge in the Master of Sinanju's voice. He shot a glance at Smith, but the CURE director had turned his attention back to his computer. Flint gray eyes studied the scrolling data stream.

"Okay-" settling on the floor next to his teacher. Remo asked "-what gives with Sinanju and Daniel?"

The old man made certain Smith was not listening. Satisfied they weren't being eavesdropped on, he turned his attention to Remo.

"You remember the tale of Master Songjong?" Chiun asked.

Remo nodded. "Pupil of Vimu. Let his Master go to Egypt to slay a princeling when he should have gone himself. Vimu died away from Sinanju, leaving poor Songjong with the mother of all headaches once he reached the Void."

Chiun crinkled his nose. "That is essentially correct," he admitted slowly. Curious fingers clutched the tip of his beard. "But why would you think that Songjong was vexed when death carried him to the place of his ancestors?"

Remo shrugged. "Nothing pissier than a Master of Sinanju with a headful of self-righteous indignation."

"And on what, pray, do you base such an assumption?"

Remo cast a slow, careful glance up and down Chiun's robes of celebration. "Absolutely wild, unsupportable conjecture?" he asked hopefully.

The Master of Sinanju's eyes were slits of suspicion. "Kindly hypothesize on your own time," he said. He smoothed the knees of his black robes.

"Whatever happened to Songjong after death is his concern," the old Korean continued. "It is his life that is recorded in the annals of Sinanju." His voice assumed the cadence of instruction. "After the death of Vimu, Songjong traveled to Babylon, there to pursue employment in the court of Nebuchadnezzar. The death of his Master had brought great sadness to the heart of Songjong, for he rightly took the blame for the fate that had befallen Vimu. He determined to repay his debt in this life by amassing tribute so great as to wipe the stain of shame away from his name in the histories of our village.

"King Nebuchadnezzar joyously welcomed Master Songjong, for well he knew of the Pearl of the Orient and the assassins it produced. This because another Babylonian king of the same name had been blessed with the services of a previous Master half a century before. So Songjong found employment with Nebuchadnezzar, and great was his reign. For a time."

At his desk, the CURE director briefly looked up in mild annoyance. "You do not have to wait here," he said.

Remo waved Smith away. "We don't mind." To Chiun he said, "Did things sour in Babylon?"

"In a manner of speaking," Chiun replied vaguely. He continued before Remo could question further. "It was after the capture of Jerusalem. Thanks to the strategic use of the Master of Sinanju's skills and council, Nebuchadnezzar enjoyed a great victory over the Hebrew kingdom. The city was destroyed, and a large group of prisoners was taken away. Some were of royal descent. One of these was a troublesome young know-it-all named Daniel.

"Now Songjong saw mischief in the eyes of this young nuisance and, rather than allow him to work some wicked scheme of revenge against his captors, recommended to the king that the youth be put to death. But Nebuchadnezzar was flushed with his great victory and dismissed the advice.

"While in service to the king, Songjong did occasionally travel to distant corners of the kingdom. One night while Songjong was away, the king had a distressing dream. When none of his wise men could interpret it, he summoned the captive Daniel, who had a reputation as a sort of soothsayer. To the delight of Nebuchadnezzar, the slave was able to discern the meaning of the dream."

"No kidding," Remo said. "What did it mean?"

"What?" Chiun asked, annoyed that the flow of his narrative had been disrupted.

"The dream. What did it mean?"

"How should I know?" the Master of Sinanju said, scowling. "Dreams are baby stories created by the gods to keep the brains of dimwits busy at night-lest, restive, they scurry out ears and scamper away."

"I thought they were a wish your heart made."

The old man gave him a baleful look. "There are inmates under lock and key here at Fortress Folcroft who have greater attention spans than you. Perhaps I will go tell Songjong's tale to them."

"No fair," Remo said. "They're strapped to their beds. There's probably a law." An icy stare and he raised his hands in surrender.

Chiun resumed his storytelling tone. "Though a king, Nebuchadnezzar was not the wisest man in his kingdom. Rather than simply accept the fool words of his lying captive, he sought to reward the wizard who claimed to have insight into the dreams of men. By the time Songjong returned from his journey, Daniel had risen from the position of lowly captive to ruler of the whole district of Babylon."

"That must have been one hell of a dream."

"Since it was the king's wish that Daniel hold this station, Songjong attempted to make the arrangement work. However, he soon discovered that all was not as it had been. Nebuchadnezzar soon began to rely more on the slave's counsel than on that of Songjong. Not long after Daniel's ascendancy in his court, Nebuchadnezzar was discovered attempting to milk a dog."

Remo's brow dropped low. "Attempting to what a what?" he asked, voice fiat.

"Songjong thought it strange, as well," Chiun agreed, nodding wisely.

"I should hope so," Remo replied.

"But the lapse in the king's sanity did not last. Soon Nebuchadnezzar was himself once more. He resumed his great work of cultivating the Chaldean Empire, which he had established with the aid of Songjong. In this time he also built the Hanging Gardens of Babylon for his wife. All was well. Until the day he was found cavorting naked with a leper in the pool of the god Marduk Bel."

Remo sighed. "I'm beginning to see a pattern here."

Chiun nodded. "As did Songjong. He suspected that the Hebrew captive Daniel was responsible for the king's bouts of madness. He was a diviner and a wizard, as well as a man who had seen his homeland destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. The deterioration of the king's mind coincided with Daniel's arrival. It was a logical assumption."

"So was he slipping Nebuch a mickey, or what?"

"Songjong never found out," Chiun said, voice sad. "Nebuchadnezzar was too steeped in madness to learn the truth. When he began to imagine himself an ox and journey into the fields to eat grass, Songjong shook the dust of Babylon from his sandals and left to seek out other clients."

The Master of Sinanju stopped. Sighing with great sadness, he began to fuss with the knees of his robes. Remo waited for him to continue, but the old man seemed finished.

"And?" Remo asked.

"And what?" the Master of Sinanju said.

"What happened to Songjong?"

Chiun seemed puzzled by the question. "I told you. He went off to ply his art elsewhere."

"So what about Daniel?"

"Daniel the Nuisance thrived in the court of mad King Nebuchadnezzar. Of course he fell out of favor in time and was thrown into a den of lions, as you are annoyingly aware, thanks to that Christian almshouse where you wasted your youth. He claimed after his safe deliverance that the God of Israel sent angels to shut the lions' mouths. It is more likely that the animals did not like the taste of ham."

"So that's it?" Remo asked. "We hold a three-thousand-year-old grudge against Daniel just 'cause he outfoxed us?"

"While that is more than enough," Chiun said, "there is another moral..." He arched an eyebrow.

His age-speckled head tipped ever so slightly in Smith's direction.

The CURE director had remained hunched over his computer throughout the story. With the sudden silence, however, he raised his gray head.

"What is it?" Smith asked, brow creasing.

"Little Father, Smith isn't out grazing on Folcroft's back lawn," Remo said.

A look of dark anger settled on the old Korean's weathered face. "Of course he is not," Chiun said. "A shallow grave awaits the dastard who would suggest such slander. Emperor Smith is clear of eye, mind and spirit. Hail Smith. Sinanju serves on bended knee the ever wise guardian of the Eagle throne."

A hint of embarrassment colored Smith's ashen cheeks. "Thank you, Master Chiun," he said. Clearing his throat, he returned to his work.

When Smith's head was bowed once more, the Master of Sinanju turned angrily to Remo.

"Are you as mad as this one?" he hissed in Korean. "Never tell the lunatic that you think he is a lunatic."

"I don't think he is," Remo insisted, also in Korean.

"Do not make me question your sanity, as well, Remo Williams," the old Asian said.

"Give it a rest, Chiun. Smith isn't, wasn't and never has been crazy. If you think I'm going to ditch him like Songjong ditched Nebbitynuzzle, you can forget it. Smith's going to have to keel over for me to leave."

"Bah," Chiun said, waving a bony hand. "That time has passed."

Remo frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Listen," the Master of Sinanju instructed, nodding to Smith.

Confused, Remo pitched his hearing toward the CURE director. He heard the tapping of Smith's fingers on the keyboard. Beyond that he detected the strong heartbeat, a congenital heart defect having been corrected by a pacemaker implant some six years previous. There was nothing more.

"I don't hear anything," Remo said.

"Precisely," Chiun replied. "A year ago it was there. Two years ago it was stronger still. The dark cloud of life's end had settled. Once there were the creaks and sputters of a man ready to welcome death. Now that is all gone. Look at him toiling like a man ten years his junior."

Remo had noticed it before. Smith had seemed infused with new vigor. He had assumed it was wishful thinking.

"It's the kid, isn't it." It was a statement of fact, not a question.

Chiun nodded tightly. "At this rate Smith will last many more years. I might not be here when comes the time for you to choose your next emperor. Of course, we could remove the mad middleman by having this modern Nebuchadnezzar committed to his own asylum. Smith could live out his remaining years in dignity, safe under the watchful gaze of Sinanju here in Fortress Folcroft. In the meantime, the Regent could assume his throne with us at his side."

"A perfect plan." Remo nodded. "Except Smitty won't go silent into that good straightjacket, his wife would have to have him committed and wouldn't, and I won't go along with it and neither will Howard."

"Yes," Chiun agreed. "The Prince is aggravating in his lack of ambition. I blame the old one. They are like two white peas in a pod." He sighed unhappily. "Thanks to his presence, Smith's natural end is now many years away. I can only hope that if I am not here when the time comes that you do the right thing."

"Right thing will be to leave, Little Father. No Master shall work for an Emperor's successor. It's in the rule book, loophole or no loophole."

Chiun's papery lips thinned. "Do not be certain," he said cryptically. "Thank the gods I had foresight to anticipate your obstinacy."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means the loophole, as you call it, is already set. It is up to you only to not mess everything up." And with that, the old man picked himself up on two long fingers. Still cross-legged, he turned from Remo, resettling on the threadbare carpet. As he studied the dust dancing in the shadows of Smith's office, there was a look of hard resolve on his weathered face.

Remo could see there would be no further questioning of his teacher. Wary now of what both the immediate and distant future held in store for him, Remo turned his attention back to Smith. To await news of Judith White.

Chapter 15

The leggy anchorwoman was gushing over some new movie. On a stool across the Newsfotainment Now! set, a reporter for the program flashed a set of teeth as white as angel wings while nodding his agreement.

"Absolutely," the reporter enthused. "This is simply the greatest movie I've ever seen, Mary. Last night's star-studded L.A. premiere was the hottest seat in town for the film that already has Hollywood talking Oscar."

In the cluttered GenPlus Enterprises office, Mark Howard grunted at the small television.

"The Academy Awards are a year away," he muttered.

Mark hadn't brought his laptop with him. Dr. Smith's work ethic was now Mark Howard's own. These days, without his computer to occupy him, he was completely lost.

For a while he had picked through some of the books in the office. But they were virtually all dedicated to genetics, a subject Mark barely understood. He had finally given up on the books and snapped on the TV.

On the screen, the reporter's teeth were polished ivory.

"Producer Barry Schweid denies it, Mary," he gushed, "but the rumor mill is already talking sequel."

Eyes barely registering the TV screen, Mark shifted in the chair. He was going stir crazy.

He had been alone in this room for hours. In addition to the water samples from the Westchester Golf Club, which he had personally collected, Mark had made arrangements for samples of other bottled-water brands to be brought to New York's GenPlus facility. It was necessary to see if Lubec Springs alone was the source of the genetic mutation. The last sample of commercial springwater had arrived at the White Plains genetic-research facility at the same time as Mark. All had been whisked off for immediate testing.

Now, hours later, Mark drummed his fingers on a desk that was not his own and stared blankly at the television.

The office belonged to Dr. Andrew Mills, the top research scientist at GenPlus. A plastic toy that looked like a spiral staircase sat at the corner of the desk. The steps of the toy were colored in reds, yellows and greens.

Leaning forward, Mark picked up the DNA model. It was incredible to think that he lived in an age when the basic building blocks of life could be disassembled and reshuffled.

Mark had read news stories in recent years detailing cases of strange genetic experiments. There were the various cloning stories. These had been most prominent. But just one year before there had been the one about the spider-goat.

In a story straight out of science fiction, goats had been genetically crossbred with spiders. The resulting creature was only one-seventy-thousandth spider, but in its milk it produced a thin web. Researchers claimed that the web was proportionate in strength to that of a spider. Clothing spun from the web would be lighter than cotton and three times stronger than Kevlar. The military applications were obvious.

It was strange. Research of this kind-meant to benefit mankind-was not fundamentally different from that conducted by Judith White. How many other Judith Whites were toiling out there right now in dusty corner labs, waiting to release who knew what horrors on a human race that had put perhaps too much of its faith in science?

Mark was thinking wary thoughts about the future when the office door finally sprang open.

A breathless, middle-aged man burst inside, jowly face flushed. A white name tag pinned to his lab coat identified him as Dr. Mills.

Mark rose quickly to his feet.

"Good news, Mr. Marx," Dr. Mills announced, using the cover alias Howard had given him. He thought Mark was a special FBI agent. "The other samples checked clean. The contamination is limited to the Lubec Springs batch."

"You're sure?" Mark demanded.

"We tested twice. There were the usual impurities in the rest-most springwater isn't much different from ordinary tap water. But the transgenic bodies are present exclusively in the Lubec Springs samples you brought in."

Mark didn't need to hear more. He grabbed the phone from the desk. Shielding it with his body, he stabbed the 1 button repeatedly. Smith picked up on the first ring.

"Report," the CURE director announced crisply. "It's only the Lubec Springs water that's affected," Mark said quickly. "All the other samples are clean."

"They are certain?" Smith pressed.

Mark turned to Dr. Mills. "Any chance-any at all-you could be mistaken?" he demanded.

The geneticist shook his head. "No, sir," he replied. "We knew what to look for. The other samples were clear."

Mark turned back to the phone. "He said-"

"I heard," Smith interrupted. "This limits our focus. I will dispatch Remo and Chiun to Maine at once. Report back here immediately. Tell the staff there to remain. We will coordinate to get more samples to them just in case."

"Gotcha. I'll be back soon." He returned the phone to its cradle and grabbed up his suit jacket from a nearby chair. "We need you to stay at work, Doctor," Mark said as he shrugged on his coat. "We only brought you a random sampling for testing. We'll be shipping some more. With any luck, your findings will hold. Thanks for your help."

Dr. Mills offered a nervous grin. "Thank you for the chance," he said. "Our molecular biologists are fascinated. None of them were around the first time. You know, Boston, 1978. And the BostonBio research data from a few years ago was confiscated by the government I think. I've heard it's surfaced on the Internet, but I wouldn't trust anything I found on Usenet. Basically, what I've heard up until today has been largely speculation and scientific hearsay."

The geneticist was still smiling with nervous excitement. Mark Howard did not return the smile. "You'll forgive me, Doctor, if I don't share your enthusiasm," he said, surprised at the coldness in his own voice. "We'll get those fresh samples to you as quickly as we can. Excuse me."

As Howard brushed past him, Dr. Mills's smile faded.

"I-I didn't mean..." he stammered. "I'm sorry. Anyway, the FBI shouldn't be too worried. Much of the material in the Lubec batch was already inert."

At the door, Mark stopped. "Inert?"

"Dead." Mills nodded. "It's still detectable, but the stuff is dying. It's more potent than the original batch from the seventies-at least from what we can tell-but it's weaker than the BostonBio stuff from three years ago."

Mark's brow dropped low. "It's been altered?"

"As far as we can tell, yes. We haven't cracked all the codes yet, obviously. That could take months or years. But it's definitely not the same stuff according to everything I've ever read on the subject. The biggest change is from the BostonBio batch. The mutational effect of that stuff was permanent. This is only temporary."

Mark was trying to wrap his brain around this. There had been cases of gene-altering material stolen from BostonBio three years ago. He and Dr. Smith had assumed this was what they were dealing with. But substantial changes to the formula meant one thing: access to a lab.

"How temporary are the effects?" Mark asked.

"Ooo, not sure," Dr. Mills said. "Without an undiluted sample of the actual formula and subjects to test it on, I can't say for certain. But based on past cases, probably two weeks. Maybe three. Of course, they can be reexposed to the formula, extending the duration of change."

Howard nodded. "Thank you again, Doctor," he said. Turning, he headed out into the hall.

He was only a few doors along when Dr. Mills called after him.

"Mr. Marx!"

Howard almost forgot his cover name. When he turned, Dr. Mills was leaning into the hall.

"I think you should see this," he called worriedly. Mark hurried back up the hall. Inside the office, Dr. Mills was pointing to the small television. On the screen, the entertainment program had fed into the news.

A female reporter stood on a rural road. Behind her, a group of protesters marched back and forth carrying large signs. The slogans H-2-No!, Water We Fighting For! and S.O.L: Save Our Leech were printed in bold letters.

Mark didn't know why the geneticist had called him back. He was about to ask when the reporter began speaking.

"This was the scene earlier today outside the Lubec Springs bottling plant here in Lubec, Maine," the woman droned. "Environmental activists have gathered to protest the destruction of the natural habitat of a local species threatened with extinction. Supporters have poured in from around the country in the hope of raising awareness and to stem the tide of what has, for many, become the latest victim in the rising flood of man's cruelty toward the species with whom he shares the Earth."

The scene cut to protest footage shot earlier in the day. Mark Howard immediately recognized the celebrities featured in the segment. Bobby Bugget took center stage, flanked by the kleptomaniac actress and the stock-fixing happy homemaker.

"Alls I know," Bugget drawled, "is that mankind'd better watch out who on the food chain he decides to stomp on. You never know when the worm you squish today might turn around and bite you on the ass."

There seemed a look of exhausted desperation on the singer's tan face. The camera cut back to the reporter.

"Sober words from Bobby Bugget, a man who cares. Live in Lubec, Maine, I'm-"

The TV snapped off. Mark Howard withdrew his hand.

"Is this a problem?" Dr. Mills asked worriedly. When he turned, Mark Howard was already heading out the door. The assistant director of CURE was fumbling his cell phone from his jacket pocket.

The look on the young man's face was that of someone who had just been told the exact date and time of Armageddon.

Chapter 16

Dr. Emil Kowalski plodded slowly up the east wing hall of San Diego's Genetic Futures, Incorporated building.

Though a small man, he moved with the swaying, lazy pace of the obese. At some point in the recent past, someone had dubbed him "The Cow." His walk, as well as his sad brown eyes and deep, slow manner of speech, cemented the nickname among the other scientists at Genetic Futures.

A wall of windows on Kowalski's left looked out on a small enclosed courtyard. Sunlight poured in, illuminating name plates and door numbers. All the men and women on this floor were scientists, and all were beneath Dr. Kowalski, Genetic Futures's premier geneticist. A voice here and there called hello as Kowalski passed open doors.

Each time, without turning, Dr. Kowalski gave a long hello. Drawn out on the last syllable, it sounded like a human parody of an animal lowing.

Dr. Kowalski didn't look in any of the open doors. His droopy eyes were staring out the window.

The courtyard was so green, so lush. Always well tended. During the worst California droughts, it was always as fresh as a country meadow.

By the time he reached his own office, Emil's stomach was growling.

He let himself in and shut the door behind him. Plodding across the room, he sank in his chair. He pulled out a small plastic sandwich bag from a brown paper lunch bag tucked away in his bottom desk drawer.

The contents weren't as green as the succulent courtyard grass. They weren't even as rich as they had been when he'd clipped them in his backyard that morning. But they were good enough to settle his longing stomach.

Dr. Kowalski fished in the back and pulled out a fat clump of grass clippings. He stuffed it greedily in between cheek and gums. He was in heaven the instant he started chewing. Moaning in ecstasy, he sat back in his chair. Eyes closed, he savored the sweet sensation.

Over the past two years he had become a grass connoisseur.

He liked the simple heft of orchard or meadow grasses, the body of Bengal grass, the tang of Kentucky bluegrass and the insouciance of the haughtier millets. He reveled in the seductive danger of sword grass.

It hadn't always been this way. For most of his fifty-two years on the planet, he had seen grass as a forgettable part of the scenery. Nothing important. A nuisance, really. Something that he hated to mow since childhood and for which a few years earlier he'd finally hired a professional service to care for when the dandelions and crabgrass in his own yard eventually got too wild.

Not anymore. Two years ago he had fired his service. He was back to caring for his own lawn.

No one else was allowed near it. Emil obsessed over it. He was out there every night and all weekend long. He had put up a fence to keep out unwanted animals and neighborhood children. He mowed it personally, working for hours with an old-fashioned push mower, lest a single poisonous drop of gas or oil touch soil or grass. And once it was mowed, he saved every little clipping in dated bags in freezer and refrigerator. He had even had a brief, unfortunate flirtation with canning. Grass had become his life.

He had brought in a fresh bag today. Emil had earned fresh. After all, now was a very stressful time. Although he no longer felt stress quite the same way as normal people.

Chewing on a wad of grass always gave him a feeling of wonderful isolation. As if he were the only creature in all of creation. He never used to get that. Life was always a crush of people and daily stresses. But now he could stare into space for hours, his mind completely blank, with no thought of the intruding world.

And he owed it all to one amazing, wonderful woman.

At a genetics conference in Atlanta two years ago, he had met the woman who would change his life. She had kept to herself mostly. Talked to a few geneticists here and there. It almost seemed that she was interviewing potential employees. When Emil Kowalski met the raven-haired, beauty he didn't know what to make of her.

She was undeniably brilliant. She could discuss genetic theory and practice better than any mind he'd ever met. The men she spoke to weren't able to keep up. No slouch in his field, Emil Kowalski was made to feel like a freshman high-school biology student by this unknown female scientist.

She called herself Dr. Judy Fishbaum. No one at the conference had ever heard of her.

Despite the Atlanta heat, the woman kept a coat draped over one shoulder. That struck Emil as very odd.

She stood differently. Not like other people. It was as if she were keeping her one visible arm free to lash out. It was a stance for a prison, where one expected attack at any moment from any direction.

And the way she held the hidden arm. Shoulder down. So protective, For a little while Emil thought that she might be a recent amputee, embarrassed by a missing limb. But he dismissed that theory when he saw something move beneath the jacket. Whatever might be wrong, there was something there.

When she got Emil alone in the lounge of the hotel where the conference was being held, the woman who called herself Judy Fishbaum finally took off her coat.

He knew at once where she'd gotten her fascination with genetics. Her right arm was not fully formed. Undoubtedly a congenital defect had guided her into her current field.

Dr. Kowalski hadn't been prepared. He couldn't help but look. When she caught him staring, he was surprised by her reaction. He had assumed most people who had lived all their lives with a deformity would react to insensitive stares either with some level of embarrassment or anger. There wasn't a flicker of either on her pale face.

She didn't even look away. She continued to stare Emil straight in the eye.

"You're interested in this?" she asked, with not a flicker of emotion in her voice. The arm was raised. It was half the size of an adult arm. "It's not finished growing yet," she confided.

Emil Kowalski got a good look at the limb. There was a purr of pleasure from his companion when she saw the look of surprised understanding that crossed his face.

The arm didn't match. For one thing the skin was far too young for a woman somewhere in her late thirties. It was a child's skin. It was smooth and unmuscled with soft baby fat. The limb wasn't deformed in the least. Just small. As if the aging had been arrested years before.

"Oh," he said, his own embarrassment changing over to fascination. "It's not yours."

"Of course it is," she replied. "It's just not part of the original equipment." She flexed five pudgy fingers.

"Is it a graft?" Dr. Kowalski asked.

Doctors were doing that now. Grafting limbs. The success rate wasn't great, due to rejection by the body's immune system, but the work held promise. However, in the cases Emil had heard about, great care was taken to match the donor limb to the host. He had never heard of anyone grafting a child's arm on an adult's body.

"No," she replied. "Do you ever wonder-" she read his name tag "-Emil, why one strand of hair will fall out, only to be replaced by another? Or why one set of teeth is replaced by another in childhood, but a lost tooth in adulthood doesn't grow back?"

"Simple," Emil said. "Encoding. The body does what it's programmed to do."

"Yes, simple," she said. "It seems so odd to me. Hair is nothing. A throwback to another evolutionary stage. Human beings no longer need hair to survive. Yet why does nature still give priority to replacing worthless hair and not to vital organs? Or limbs?"

It was the way she said it. The stress she put on the last word, accompanied by another flex of that child's hand.

The truth hit Dr. Emil Kowalski like a hard fist to the stomach.

"That isn't a graft," he whispered, awed. Winking, she offered another contented purr. The coat came back on, covering the limb that Dr. Kowalski knew should not be, but was.

This was big. Research was heading in this direction, but results were still decades away. He needed to hear more.

Later, in a dark corner of the hotel bar, he heard her theories on transgenic organisms. Science was becoming involved more in the creation of new species. It was easier to mix genetic material and start from scratch. She explained that inherited genetic traits from one organism could be spliced into an existing organism without rejection by the host.

By this point it was very late. The bar had cleared out. She had ordered a martini at one point during the evening, but had taken not a single sip.

From the start she insisted that Emil drink only springwater. She told him she wouldn't waste time sharing thoughts with him if he wasn't stone sober. Dr. Kowalski agreed. He wasn't about to refuse an order from the most beautiful, brilliant companion he had ever gone out with.

They were whispering. Dr. Kowalski felt like a spy. It was all so exciting, so dangerous.

"There was research going on in this field before," he said. "You must have heard about it. In Boston? But it didn't work out. Both times there were deaths. After the last time, Congress passed a law against human testing."

"Human laws don't apply to us," she said.

Dr. Kowalski wasn't sure exactly what she meant by that. And at that moment he didn't really care. He put down his glass of water.

He was dizzy. His tongue felt too big for his mouth. By the time he realized she had slipped something in his drink, it no longer mattered.

He soon learned that his companion was the notorious Dr. Judith White, the infamous madwoman of BostonBio. She had used her own formulas to alter her features slightly just enough so that none at the conference recognized her. And that wasn't all.

The change came over Emil Kowalski rapidly. In the first terrible moments, the last vestiges of his humanity conjured images of bloody, half-eaten corpses like he'd heard about on the news. But when it was done, he had no desire to eat human flesh.

"I feel different," he said, puzzled. "Am I like you?" His voice was slower now than before. A low, contented moan rose from deep in his throat.

She shook her head. "I need someone with your brains, Emil, but with no ambition and total loyalty," Judith White explained. "If I'd made you like me, you'd be like all my young. Thinking with your belly. I couldn't have bodies piling up around your lab. That would draw the authorities. I've made you a totally new hybrid. I drew on a few different species. You're now as indolent as a cow. No Nobel ambitions from you. I'll tell you what to do and you'll do it. The rest of the time you'll do pretty much nothing. And you're as loyal as a dog. You won't dream of turning on me. Feel proud, Emil. You're a totally new creature, unlike any other on the planet."

Emil liked the idea of that. Almost as much as he liked the woman who sat across from him in the bar. He would die before he betrayed her. Knew it on an instinctive level. He wondered what his new wonderful friend wanted from him.

"I need a lab," Judith White said. "A good, permanent one. I can't keep moving from place to place, plundering equipment here and there, afraid of being caught. I need a base of operations, sweetcakes, and Genetic Futures is it."

And so began Emil Kowalski's relationship with Dr. Judith White.

Emil was satisfied just to do what he was told to do. For the past two years he did his work, and when he wasn't doing his work he spent his time either caring for his lawn or-better yet-staring blankly into space.

Dr. Emil Kowalski was staring at the wall of his San Diego office when there came a sudden knock at his door.

Emil wiped some lawn drool from his chin. "Come in," he called.

A young Genetic Futures scientist stuck his head in the room. The man seemed hesitant when he saw the dull-eyed look on Dr. Kowalski's face. He tried not to stare at the drying green dribble stain on his boss's white lab coat.

"We're all set to go," the young man said. "Whenever you get the specimen in, we'll be ready."

Kowalski nodded. "It might be days. Keep shifts on around the clock. Time will be vital when it arrives."

"Yes, sir. I'll let everyone know."

"Is there something else?"

The young man hadn't realized he was loitering in the doorway. He just couldn't believe it. There was a piece of grass sticking out of the mouth of Genetic Futures's senior geneticist. He had never believed the stories, always assuming "The Cow" nickname was just a play on Dr. Kowalski's name.

"Um, no, sir. Sorry, sir."

The young face disappeared and the door closed. Emil sat behind his desk for a short time longer, munching grass from his bag. When he finally looked at his wail clock, two hours had gone by.

That happened a lot these days. No track of time. "Oh, well," he said. "Things will get busy soon enough. Better make sure we're ready."

Adam's apple bulging, he swallowed the big lump of grass that was still in his mouth. It would be even better once it had settled in one of his stomachs for a few hours. He'd bring it up as cud that afternoon.

Mooing contentedly, Emil Kowalski plodded lazily from his office.

Chapter 17

By the eleven-o'clock news cycle, reports of new cases of feral behavior among humans had begun to die down. News reports were focusing mainly on New York, with mention of a handful of other cases in the Northeast.

In the family quarters of the White House, the President of the United States watched the late news with deep concern.

It was an hour past his normal bedtime. This President preferred to go to bed early and to rise early. He trusted in the old "healthy, wealthy and wise" adage. It seemed to work for him. Although the wealth didn't matter so much-he was from a well-off family and had taken a substantial pay cut to become President-his health was fine.

As for wisdom ...well, if the late-night shows were to be believed, he had none. According to the media, the folks from the other side were always the brilliant statesmen, the towering intellects. It was accepted as gospel that those on the President's side of the aisle were busy frantically rubbing their two brain cells together trying to make fire.

The thought always gave him a chuckle. This President was confident enough to not let such nonsense rattle him. It didn't matter to him what a handful of comedy writers in Los Angeles or anchormen in New York thought of him. Besides, he avoided network news and was normally in bed long before the latenight comics were on.

Not this night. This night there was a crisis and the President of the United States was staying up past his bedtime watching the late news.

The scenes shown were gruesome, the eyewitness accounts frightening, if true. The President had poured himself a drink, but it sat sweating in his hand. He watched the news recap with pursed lips and furrowed brow.

When it was over, the President get up from the sofa.

Walking briskly from the living room, he headed down the long hallway to his private bedroom.

His wife was away visiting family in Texas. There was no one to bother him as the President sat down on the edge of the bed and removed the cherry-red phone from his bottom bureau drawer.

He hated to make this call. He had been using this phone far too much in the past year. But the weight of the world had been dropped on his shoulders only eight months into his fledgling presidency.

With a deep appreciation for what it meant, he lifted the red receiver.

There was no need to dial. As usual, the phone was answered on the first ring.

"Yes, Mr. President?" said the familiar lemony voice.

"Hello, Smith," the President said. "The situation in New York and New England."

"Yes, sir," Smith said. "We are already working on it."

"Oh." The President was always impressed by the older man's efficiency. In a way, the lemon-voiced man reminded the President of his own secretary of defense.

"It is a complicated situation, but we believe we know who is behind the product tampering. My people left here an hour ago to put an end to the source. With any luck, the worst part of the crisis should be over by morning."

"They're now saying on the news that it resembles the case with that White woman in Boston a few years back."

"We believe she is the source," Smith said. "Either that or someone following in her footsteps. We have confirmed that it is a formula similar to hers."

"Great," the President muttered. "Another fine mess I've inherited. I'll add it to the pile." Sighing, the President took a sip from the glass he'd carried in from the living room. The ice was all but melted.

"Hopefully, we will end this by tomorrow," Smith said. "I have issued orders that all shipments of Lubec Springs water are to be intercepted. Once store back stock has been destroyed, there should be no more new cases."

The President stopped drinking. "Water?" he said. "That's what they're dumping this stuff in?"

"Yes, sir."

The President looked at the water in his glass.

"You might have given a guy a little warning, Smith."

"The problem has not spread farther down the East Coast than northern New Jersey. Washington is not a focus."

"My lucky day," the President said. Even so, he put his half-empty glass on the bureau. With his fingertips, he pushed it to a safe distance. "So why the Northeast? Lubec Springs is national. They could have shipped from coast to coast. There aren't any cases anywhere else, are there?"

"Not so far."

"Then what's so special about there?"

"We have not yet determined that," Smith replied. "If you'll excuse me now, Mr. President, my assistant has just returned."

"Smith?" the President called before the CURE director could break the connection.

"Yes, sir?"

"The FBI director mentioned something in my morning briefing about al-Khobar terrorists at an airport in Arkansas. Was that you?"

"My special person was involved, yes, sir," Smith said, obviously impatient to end the call.

"Good work, Smith. We've got them on the run. I'm sure you'll do the same with this new problem." With a tight-lipped smile, he replaced the phone and slid the drawer shut.

There was no doubt that there were messes in America these days. This was just another tossed on the heap. But messes could be cleaned up. And despite the perilous times he lived in, the President remained an eternal optimist.

Standing, he carefully picked up his water glass and brought it into the presidential bathroom. A moment later came the sound of a flushing toilet.

UP THE EAST COAST in Smith's dimly lit office, Mark Howard had shut the door quietly and slid into his plain wooden chair. He waited for the CURE director to hang up the special phone in his bottom desk drawer before speaking.

"Is there some new catastrophe?" Mark asked warily.

"No," Smith replied, rolling the drawer shut. "And I wish I shared the President's confidence that we will prevail. I have had no luck since your second call."

He had been searching for potential research facilities with a Judith White connection ever since Mark had called from his cell phone in the GenPlus parking lot an hour ago.

Smith removed his glasses, touching them to his desktop with a soft click. "The President raised a question that has puzzled me," he said, massaging his tired eyes. "Why the Northeast alone? Aside from a single case in New Jersey late this morning, it hasn't extended beyond New York. There has not been one case in any other part of the country."

"Maybe it's just where the stuff happens to have been shipped so far," Mark suggested. "Maybe she's planning on expanding. Or maybe she ran out of formula."

"Perhaps. Although if it is as you suggested in your phone call and she has a facility for producing her formula, she would not have started without first having all she needed on hand."

"The guy I spoke to was certain there were alterations to the old formula, Dr. Smith."

"Then it is a certainty she has a lab." Smith replaced his glasses. "She had to know Lubec Springs would eventually be identified as the source. If simply increasing the numbers of her species was her goal, it would have made sense to blanket as wide an area as possible. She would have wanted to infect the greatest number of people before she was found out. Yet she seemed to concentrate in only one part of the country."

A thoughtful look on his face, Smith picked up the aspirin bottle of formula from the corner of his desk. "I thought you usually used children's aspirin," Mark noted, nodding to the bottle.

"The sample Remo obtained in New York," Smith explained. He shook the bottle. Liquid sloshed inside.

"Do you want me to get rid of it?"

"No," Smith said. "For now I'll store it downstairs. In fact, it might be wise to save some frozen form of the genetic material she used in perpetuity. Perhaps from this one day an antidote or vaccine could be found."

"I notice we're both using 'she' a lot," Mark said. Smith nodded as he tapped a gnarled thumb on the bottle lid. "Given what you have learned, I am leaning more toward Judith White herself as mastermind," he said, putting the bottle aside once more.

"After all, she did not turn any of the people in her lab three years ago. None were implicated at the time and they all underwent testing after the fact. Those that she recruited at that time were not scientists. Therefore we are not now dealing with a leftover creature from that time, since they would not have her knowledge of genetics."

"It still might not be her," Mark suggested. "One of the others might have laid low for a while and then found a geneticist to turn-someone who could help. You said those briefcases of her formula were never found. They wouldn't have needed her science background to turn new recruits."

"It does not fit their pattern of behavior," Smith insisted. "They would be like all animals. Driven purely by instinct. To feed, mate. They would live in the moment. They wouldn't worry about covering their tracks all this time. Only Judith White had a vision of a greater future for the abominations she had created. She alone would have the patience to wait this long. It must be her." His frown lines deepened. "But what her plan is I have no idea."

"Well, lucky for us Remo injured her last time."

"Yes," Smith agreed. "Still, she will not be unprotected. It is not cliche to say that an injured animal is most dangerous when it is cornered. I urged Remo and Master Chiun to caution before I sent them to Maine."

"What about the protesters?" Mark asked.

Even before Mark had called, Smith's computers had pulled up reports of the Reticulated New England Speckled Leech protesters outside the Lubec Springs bottling plant.

"They should not be a problem. Our biggest concern would be exposure to the press. But there has not been great interest in their protest. The news cycle being what it is, I doubt they will get more coverage than they did today. Still, Remo and Chiun will be arriving just before dawn. Things should be quiet enough at that time for them to do what they need to and get out."

"Dr. Smith, just so you know, I'm a little worried that the protesters are from Green Earth," Mark said. They had recently encountered the environmental activist group in South America. Back then it was in the form of a former Soviet president high up in the organization. That man's foolishness had resulted in environmental devastation throughout a large part of the Caribbean.

The CURE director caught the subtle strain in his assistant's voice at the mention of Green Earth.

"It is a large organization, with interests all around the world," Smith said cautiously. "Since this and our last encounter with them seemed unconnected, I was going to chalk it up to coincidence." He peered over the tops of his rimless glasses. "Unless you think we should look deeper into their group."

Mark met the older man's level gaze.

It was a subject that gave them both discomfort. Mark had a special, almost precognitive ability that had in the past given him early insight into potential CURE problems. For the assistant director of CURE, it was like peering into a puzzle box and seeing part of the picture where others only saw a jumble of pieces.

Mark shook his head. "There's nothing right now," he said. "But there might be something coming. I don't know for sure. But we should keep an open file on them."

"Very well," Smith said. "I'll have the mainframes collate any Green Earth data they find." With a few sure strokes on his keyboard, he issued the proper commands to the basement computers. While Smith typed, Mark got to his feet. His back was sore from sitting around the GenPlus offices all evening.

"If there's nothing else, I'd better get back to work," he said. "I'll try to find that lab. You should really go home, Dr. Smith. I'll stay here tonight."

Smith glanced up, shaking his head. "If I need to, I will take a few hours' sleep on the sofa." He ignored the look of concern that passed across his assistant's face, turning his attention back to his computer screen.

Mark could see there would be no arguing. Without another word, he headed for the door.

"Mark."

Smith called him as he was opening the door. When Howard turned, he saw that the CURE director wore a thoughtful expression. Light from Smith's buried monitor cast ghostly shadows on his gray face.

"Judith White is highly intelligent," the older man said. He leaned back in his chair, considering for a long moment. "Rather than look for the lab itself, I want you to do a search for mysterious deaths. There would be no mutilations like today or back in Boston. To do so would have tipped her hand long before this, and she is much too smart for that. Given her, er, appetite, they would have to be bodies missing organs or limbs. Perhaps cases that have been attributed to a serial killer and that remain unsolved. Begin with newspaper reports, police and FBI records and expand out from there."

Orders crisply delivered, he returned to his keyboard.

It was a familiar pose. One that Mark Howard had grown used to over the past few years. The gaunt, gray man in the austere office typing assuredly at his computer. Mark didn't know why, but he found comfort in the image.

Smiling to himself, Mark gently closed the door, so as not to disturb America's last, great patriot.

Chapter 18

A Navy jet carried Remo and Chiun as far as Bangor. A waiting Coast Guard helicopter brought them to a field just outside of Jonesboro.

Smith had arranged delivery of a rental car. The helicopter was lifting off into the predawn gray above Route 1 as the rental keys were being dropped into Remo' s hand.

The pair of federal marshals who had been awakened in the dead of night with special orders to rent the car left the two Sinanju Masters beside the road. Yawning, they returned to their own vehicle as Remo and Chiun climbed into the rented car.

Both Coast Guard helicopter and U.S. Marshals took off down the coast. Remo headed in the opposite direction.

The minute they were on the highway, Remo had his foot jammed down on the accelerator. The car was soon tearing up the road at speeds in excess of one hundred miles per hour.

Chiun watched the road with some concern. "Your driving being what it is, I cannot say that you are operating this vehicle in a more reckless fashion than usual," the old Korean said as Remo nearly sideswiped his third car. "Since you have not yet crashed, flipped or otherwise mangled either it or me, one could say you are doing better than usual. However, your speed might be considered excessive by the local constabulary."

"Cops schmops," Remo said, tension tightening his jaw. "Let them catch me if they can. Besides, most cops on duty at this time of the morning are either napping in their cruisers or their mistresses' apartments."

Luckily traffic was thin so early in the day. Remo beeped and jerked the wheel, scraping out between two cars and into the left lane. He accelerated past another speeding vehicle. With another honk and twist, he was back in the right lane.

From the passenger's seat, Chiun watched the display with disapproval. "How much did Smith pay you to assassinate me?" he asked abruptly.

"Huh?" Remo said. "What are you talking about?"

"He has put me in the death seat of this carriage with maniac you behind the wheel. Obviously he wishes the Master dead. Why else did we not take the aircraft farther?"

"He was afraid White would hear the chopper, realize it wasn't supposed to be there and bolt. The last thing we want is for her to get away again."

"No," Chiun pointed out. "While that would be bad, the last thing we want is for me to be killed."

"We've all gotta go sometime, Little Father."

"Speak for yourself, Round Eyes," the Master of Sinanju said. He sighed. "I suppose my leniency in training is to blame for your poor driving skills. I noticed a marked deterioration in your skills while we were living in Castle Sinanju, which I did nothing to address."

"Yeah, Boston does have a tendency to bring out the worst in most drivers. Fortunately, I avoided the curse." He laid on the horn and drove onto the median strip to avoid a bread truck on its early-morning rounds.

Chiun shook his head sadly. "The location of Castle Sinanju should have had no effect on your driving skills. A duck may live every day of its life in a stable, but it will never try to be a horse. And do you know why?"

"Dunno. Maybe it knows how stupid it'd look herding cattle in a cigarette ad. And did you ever try to saddle a duck? Plus the Kentucky Derby would be just plain silly. Although I'd probably tune in if the jockeys were riding mallards."

Chiun gave his pupil a baleful look. "Are you quite finished?" he droned.

Remo sighed. "Why, Chiun, beyond the obvious, does a duck who lives in a stable not become a horse?"

"Because, ignoramus, the duck does not let his environment influence what he becomes. He is clever enough to remain a duck. Unfortunately, Remo, you are not as blessed as the duck. You allowed the bad drivers of that bean-eating province to influence your driving skills. If you were the duck, after one week you would leave the stable whinnying."

"Boston driving was an education," Remo insisted. "If you can survive that demolition derby, you can race a Ferrari through St. Peter's without dinging a pew."

"Go ahead. Joke if you wish. Live recklessly. Play the part of the fool and forget that an entire village lives and dies with you."

Remo glanced at his teacher. The old man was staring stonily out the windshield at the empty road ahead.

"At what point did this stop being about my driving?" Remo asked.

Chiun shook his head angrily. "The risks you take," he complained quietly. "Being Master of Sinanju does not make you invulnerable."

Remo could hear the deep concern buried beneath his teacher's angry tone. "I know that, Little Father," he said reasonably. "But I'm more than good enough for pretty much anything we're likely to meet."

"Good enough?" Chiun said. "Good enough?" he repeated, voice rising in fury. "Is that what I trained? Good enough? Is that what the villagers of Sinanju must now rely on for their daily sustenance? Good enough? Thank you, Remo, for setting all my worries to rest. And I now have your epitaph, for with that attitude I will not only be alive to write it, but I will be able to do so soon. It will read, 'Here lies Remo the Pale. He was good enough until the one day he was not.'"

The old Asian threw up his hands, hissing frustration.

"This has to do with that legend, doesn't it?" Remo asked as Chiun muttered a string of harsh Korean at the Maine countryside. "The one that says I have to be careful going through the forest where the tigers live?"

Eyes dead ahead, Chiun nodded. "It was prophesied by no less than the Great Wang himself. The forest holds danger for Shiva's avatar."

Remo could see this was important to his teacher. Still, he couldn't see the risk. He was fully Master now, whole in Sinanju. And he had encountered these creatures twice before and vanquished them both times. Still, for the sake of his teacher and father, he offered a reassuring smile.

"Don't worry, Chiun," he vowed. "I won't let my guard down."

When he turned his full attention back to the road, he missed the look of dark doubt that passed like a cloud across his teacher's face.

He pressed hard on the gas once more, and the car raced up the road for the Lubec Springs bottling plant.

JUDITH WHITE SENSED them coming. Smelled them on the air. Felt the familiar, new presence through the dense wood.

For a long time as they came, she paced back and forth in the small Lubec Springs office.

The lights were off. Through the wide picture window, her keen eyes could see far into the depths of the dark, predawn woods. Here and there she saw them. Shadows moving ever closer.

The rest wouldn't have noticed yet. When the protest had ended and the cameras had left, the others who had stood in for the dead Green Earth protestors had skulked back to the warehouse.

Probably sleeping and eating. They were mostly males, and that was nearly all the males did.

Her human memory told her she'd had the same complaint about men even when she was living her old life.

The males were virtually useless. Dumb and lazy, only concerned about their immediate desires.

Judith was glad she had used a weaker version of the formula. So far, there wasn't one male in Maine she would want to keep around forever. All of those she'd altered would change back or die. She alone was perfection. She alone would usher in the age of animal dominance.

And there was another reason she was glad these particular males would not be with her very long. Who knew? If there were others who were turned permanently, a dominant male might very well emerge to challenge her.

Although she had many answers, this wasn't one of them. The truth was, Judith didn't know for certain what would happen to her under those circumstances. Would the instinct of the creatures whose DNA she now carried compel her to take a submissive role? She doubted she could ever follow the lead of a male. And for a very simple reason.

The humans would call it jealousy. But for Dr. Judith White, it was really pure animal resentment. This was her species. She had created it. And it was she and she alone who was molding it to take its rightful place as the preeminent animal life-form on the planet.

No, the males of her kind would never rule her world. She wouldn't allow it. And once she was successful with her work here, the best humanity had to offer would fail, as well.

Alone in Owen Grude's office, Judith's head suddenly tipped sharply. Ears far more acute than mere human hearing focused on a single sound.

A soft growl. Followed by cautious footsteps the others would not hear. The shadows in the woods were closer.

Abruptly she turned, gliding in silence from the office. She moved with feline confidence through the bottling plant.

When Judith White prowled into the warehouse, the others were lounging lazily.

The few Green Earth protesters who had survived the previous day's slaughter had joined the others Judith had turned since her arrival in Maine. Some lay sleeping on crates, arms and legs dangling over the sides. Others picked through the remains of victims.

The woman who had been a TV homemaking expert was weaving human veins into edible doilies for a special breakfast treat. She had already made a lovely centerpiece from pine cones and a human heart.

In one corner, the young movie actress slept in a nest of toilet paper and bones that she'd pilfered from around the complex.

The boxer was nowhere to be seen. Already wild in his human life, he had reacted more strongly than any of the others to the formula. He was keeping to himself, prowling the road and woods outside the bottling plant.

Judith picked her way through the gathered pride. One cautious foot stepped before the next. She sniffed the cool air, tracking a fresh scent.

At her appearance, the males rose dutifully to their feet. Owen Grude came to her side.

Far behind the others was Bobby Bugget. Ever since he was forced to drink the formula, Bugget had kept to the fringes of the pack. The singer was chewing nervously on a thumb he'd scavenged from the floor.

"What is it?" Owen asked Judith.

She kept her nose in the air. "We've got company."

As she spoke, the small side door next to the big loading bays nudged slowly, cautiously open.

A female face appeared. She was bent at the waist, her chin low to the floor. She sniffed questioningly as she came into the warehouse.

A second and third came in behind. They were quickly followed by two more.

The scents in the big warehouse seemed to relax the female. Here was familiarity, safety. She didn't know why. But there was a sense of home to these surroundings.

Her strides grew more confident. As she relaxed, so too did the four males. Their aggressive hunch eased as they trailed the female into the dimly lit building.

The creatures lounging in the warehouse were roused from their torpor. Climbing out of nests and jumping down from crates, they moved to intercept the newest arrivals.

Judith White was pleased to see that, of these latest arrivals, the four males were obviously subservient to the female. This had seemed to be the case all during the night. Perhaps it wouldn't be necessary to tinker with the formula as much as she had feared.

The female broke away from her pack. The others dropped away behind her, skulking off into the shadows, yellow eyes studying the growling line that was protecting Judith White.

The new female stopped in the middle of the floor, rising proudly to her full height.

Judith's pride came forward slowly. Peering, sniffing, they nuzzled the new arrival curiously.

They quickly determined that she wasn't a threat. When the inspection was through, they broke away, fanning back out around the warehouse.

Some of the new arrivals took the acceptance of their leader as a cue. They came out of the shadows. When they tried to eat, they were chased away with growls and snapping jaws. Slinking off to the edge of the group, they gnawed the scraps that had been tossed to the concrete floor.

Judith White paid no attention to her cubs. She was sniffing the air almost as an afterthought.

"You're from New York," she announced with certainty.

"Yes," replied Elizabeth Tiflis. There was a hint of puzzlement in her deep, throaty voice.

Judith sensed her confusion. "You want to know why you're here," she said. "Eschewing the boring human notions of the metaphysical, you are here because I programmed you to be here. Just the tiniest leech DNA. Green Earth is right to want to save them. Those things have one of the strongest homing beacons for the few square feet of swamp they were born and bred in than virtually any species I've ever come across. It's pretty useless in a leech. It's not like they can migrate. But then, they can't drive. I assume that's how you got here."

"Yes," Elizabeth said.

"Did you feed along the way?"

"No, we ate before we left."

"Good," Judith said, more to herself than to Elizabeth. "I want them here, not wasting time investigating every half-eaten corpse at every Mass Pike rest stop."

Elizabeth growled confusion. "Who?" she asked.

A flicker of self-satisfaction crossed Judith White's face. "In good time," she promised. "For now, you're only part of the equation. Get something to eat."

She waved at a few uneaten Green Earth bodies that had been stacked against the wall. The men who had come with Elizabeth didn't need a second invitation. They pounced on a body, dragging it out onto the floor.

As they began to feast, Elizabeth made a face. "I prefer a fresh kill," Elizabeth complained.

"There will be plenty of time for that later, once more of the others have arrived."

"If they arrive," Elizabeth said. "If the same thing happens to them as happened to us, they'll be lucky to get here at all." With the words came a soft shudder of fear.

Judith felt it in the woman. Fear was unusual for her species.

Elizabeth had chased back two of the males who had accompanied her from New York. She had settled in with the others at the protester's corpse. Her rounded bottom settled back on coiled legs.

"What do you mean?" Judith asked.

"We were taken captive. Two humans nearly stopped us from escaping."

Judith sensed it again. The fear. "Describe them," Judith ordered.

"They were fast," Elizabeth said. "And strong. They weren't like the others. I sensed no fear in them."

"What did they look like?"

Judith was surprised at the urgency in her own voice. The others noted it, too. Worried eyes glanced up.

"One was Asian," Elizabeth said. "Too old for a meal. No meat on his bones at all. The young, white one had dark hair. About six feet tall. Deep eyes, high cheekbones. He had very thick wrists."

With the description came a cold shudder that passed like ice through her body. This time, Elizabeth was not the source. Her meal was abruptly forgotten.

Elizabeth was instantly alert. Back arched, she stood up on hands and feet. Brown eyes darted to empty shadows.

It was instinct. Elizabeth didn't know why she was searching the corners of the warehouse. Only that her body had picked up a telegraphed dread.

And Judith White was the source.

The others sensed Judith's alarm. A thrill of panic rippled through the drafty warehouse. Males and females alike stopped whatever they were doing. They pawed the floor and sniffed nervously at the air for some unknown fear.

But while the rest didn't know why they feared, Judith White knew. It was those two. The men Elizabeth Tiflis had described could be no one else.

Judith was angry at the instinct that made her fear. If she were to succeed, she would have to master the panic.

Animal noises filled the warehouse. The creatures that had once been men and women paced and snorted at shadows.

"Calm yourselves," Judith growled loudly. "There's nothing to worry about."

Spinning, she left the fearful creatures growling at the walls of the big warehouse. Judith White hurried back to the safety of the front office. To quell the fear.

Chapter 19

The bare bulb was snapped on from a switch above. A moment later, Harold Smith climbed down the basement stairs.

A set of keys from his desk drawer was clutched tight in his hand as he made his way around the bottom of the staircase. Nearby was the secret wall behind which CURE's mainframes hummed. Smith bypassed that part of the room.

He found a small steel door tucked away behind the ancient boiler. Grimy letters on a discolored brass plate read "Patient Records." A note written in Smith's hand instructed any Folcroft staff who wanted to enter the room to see Director Smith for the keys.

The paper was yellowed from age. Smith had posted the note thirty years before. No one ever asked for the keys.

He unlocked the heavy bolt and pushed open the door.

Inside was another bare bulb.

Smith rarely came into this room. The last time was a year ago when he had finally gotten around to showing it to Mark Howard. Before that it had been years. The only person to come down here with any regularity was Smith's secretary. Whenever Eileen Mikulka needed to access old patient records, she used her own set of keys.

Six big filing cabinets held a century's worth of Folcroft medical records. In addition to these, three small stainless-steel drums sat against the far wall. There was a temperature gauge on the side of each tank.

When Smith peered at the dial on the nearest container he saw that it was holding steady at -196 degrees Celsius.

The other two tanks were no longer functioning. Smith considered pulling the plug on the third tank. For a moment, his hand hovered near the off switch. After all, it had already served its purpose. For all the good that had done any of them. He had explained that to Mark the previous year, as well. But the pragmatist in him won out.

There might yet be a need. He left the tank running. A small refrigerator-the kind used in college dormitories-sat unplugged in the corner. Smith plugged it in. Fishing in his pocket, he took out the aspirin bottle of Judith White's formula and put it in the fridge.

He'd find out proper storage later on. Perhaps he'd have to start up one of the other liquid-nitrogen tanks. And with any luck, Remo would get him an undiluted sample of the formula. That would be best for a vaccine.

When he was done, Smith shut the refrigerator door and took one last look around the room to make certain he hadn't forgotten anything. Satisfied, he closed the storage room door, locking it up tight once more. In the dark closet, the old fridge chugged softly.

Chapter 20

The deer carcass lay in the wet grass at the soft shoulder of the road.

There had been a feeding frenzy. Virtually all but head and legs were gone. As Remo and Chiun sped by in their rented car, Remo saw many footprints amid the scattered brown fur around the creature. Although the prints looked human, they were softer, with the weight more toward toe than heel.

"That's the third one we've passed in two miles," he commented grimly.

The Master of Sinanju had remained silent for the past few miles, concern for his pupil weighing heavy on his shoulders. But when his eyes strayed from the dead deer to the road ahead, a spark of life lit his dour face.

"Your persistent stubbornness is too stressful on my delicate senses," the old Asian announced from the passenger's seat. "Stop for a moment that I might collect my frazzled nerves." He tapped an urgent fingernail on the dashboard, pointing to a tiny strip mall that was speeding toward them on the right. "There is a good spot."

Remo followed his teacher's extended finger. "That's a real estate office, Little Father."

"Is it?" Chiun asked innocently. He pretended to see the sign for the first time. "So it is."

For a time two years ago the old Korean had been on Remo's case to buy a house in Maine. The rocky coast and bitter winter reminded him of his native Sinanju. Remo thought he'd won that battle when they'd moved into their new town house in Connecticut.

"We're not stopping," Remo said firmly.

"A good son who did not cause his father in spirit to worry for his well-being all the time would stop."

"We're not buying a house in Maine. Case closed."

Chiun watched the building zoom by. He sank back into his seat, folding his arms inside his sleeves. "You are an evil man, Remo Williams. We are already in the emperor's potato province. What harm would come of looking?"

"Walking out with a deed for one thing," Remo said. "Look, Chiun, I'm happy where we're living now. Living in Connecticut is close to Smith, but not too close. We've got a couple of airports nearby. It's convenient. Maine is too far off the beaten path."

"I am not surprised that you would be content with our current accommodations." Chiun sniffed. "I have never known a pig to complain about the quality of the mud he is wallowing in. I, on the other hand, am not happy. For one thing, it is only a matter of time before squatters take up residence in the home adjacent to our own. At my age I do not need to worry about Gypsy horse thieves keeping me awake until all hours of the night with their smelly cooking and rowdy tambourine banging."

The other side of their duplex had remained vacant the entire time they'd lived in Connecticut. The Master of Sinanju had done yeoman's work chasing away any potential neighbors. But since their work for Smith sometimes kept them away for extended periods of time, the old Korean had been growing more concerned that the empty town house next door would be rented while they were away.

"I'm not worried that we'll get neighbors," Remo said absently. He had caught sight of something up ahead.

"Of course not. You would let any undesirables move in. It is up to me to maintain the quality of our neighborhood."

Remo was about to say something on the nature of racism, freedom in America to live wherever you wanted and Chiun's definition of undesirables, which included-on a good day-everyone in the world who wasn't Korean and-on a bad day-them, too. But he was too distracted to speak.

At their approach, the thing that had caught his eye had turned into several things. As they rounded a bend in the road, the several became several hundred.

In the passenger's seat, the Master of Sinanju's spine became more rigid as he sat up stiffly in his seat.

The winding road passed by a dairy farm. On both right and left wide grazing fields stretched to dark woods.

Intermingled with the smell of manure was the stench of death.

"Holy cow;" Remo said softly.

Throughout the predawn fields were scattered the carcasses of hundreds of dead dairy cows. The animals lay in mottled grass, sightless eyes staring up at the brightening sky. Flanks were chewed; bellies were gaping black wounds.

Fences had been broken near the road. Some of the cows had been tossed out by a tumbledown stone wall.

A battered truck was parked at the side of the road. Three farmhands were struggling to load a dead cow into the rusted back. Two more of the animals were already sprawled on a blanket of damp hay. With a final heave, they shoved the dead animal into the rear of the truck.

The men watched in suspicion as Remo and Chiun drove by.

A lone dead animal was dumped a few dozen yards down the road, its milky white eyes staring blankly at oncoming traffic. A sign near the gutted cow pointed the way to the Lubec Springs bottling plant.

"That's not just White that did all that," Remo commented as they passed the last cow. The farmland fell away as woods closed in darkly around them.

"Animals seek their own kind," Chiun said. "In this they are like men. She has created more like her elsewhere. Did you not think that she would here, as well?"

"I guess," Remo said. "I just didn't think there'd be so many. That was a hell of a lot of dead cows back there."

As they drove, he found himself more and more studying the deep forest that lined the road.

He found the turnoff for Lubec Springs. They parked their car near a house that seemed abandoned and headed up the road to the bottling plant.

"Perhaps we should not have parked so close," the Master of Sinanju suggested as they walked the forest-lined road. "The animal may attempt to flee if it feels threatened."

Their steady, gliding feet made not a sound on pebble or sand as they slipped like shadows through the dim light.

"She won't run at the sound of every car," Remo said.

"Unlike you, she retains a hint of human intelligence. She surely knows the difference between a car engine stopping and one that has driven by."

"Maybe," Remo said. "But even if she's skittish, it looks like we don't have to worry about the rest of them taking off."

His senses were trained on the woods around them. Remo had been aware of them ever since he parked the car. A rustle of fallen leaves, the soft crack of a twig. Stealthy sounds that-except for the two men walking along that lonely Maine road-would have gone unnoticed by human ears. The sounds of animals circling prey, closing ever tighter. Their numbers continued to swell the closer Remo and Chiun came to the bottling plant.

Remo spent a few moments picking out individual heartbeats. He lost count at three dozen, finally giving up.

"Okay, so there's even more than we thought," he said as they walked along. He pitched his voice so low only the Master of Sinanju would hear.

"Do not include me in your assumptions," Chiun replied, making a show of ignoring the woods around them. "And I will remind you once more to have a care."

"Relax," Remo said testily. "So there's more than we bargained for. Four, four dozen. Big schmiel. In case you forgot, I have met these things before, you know."

Chiun nodded gravely. "And it is apparent that my memory is better than yours. I recall the first time your belly was split open. In your second encounter, your chest was torn apart."

"Blah-biddy-blah-blah-blah," Remo said. "I lost some ground, but I rallied in the end."

"Only after your Sinanju training all but disappeared."

"That was only the first time."

All at once, Chiun stopped. Remo halted beside him.

The woods around them hummed with animal life. Remo could feel the heartbeats closing in.

Chiun ignored the forest and the creatures within it. In his unwavering gaze, his entire world seemed to compress until all that remained was the man standing before him. His hazel eyes were fixed on his pupil, burning deep.

"Do not gather false security from our past successes against these creatures," the old Korean hissed. "Whatever happens, remember well the prophecy."

Remo's attention was torn between his teacher and the woods. Through the trees he saw a shadow, then two. Moving stealthily, they came ever closer to the road.

"I remember," Remo promised. "'Even Shiva must walk with care when he passes the jungle where lurk other night tigers.' Don't worry, I got it."

A bony hand gripped his forearm. In the early days of training, it would have been a slap or some other inflicted pain to impress on his pupil the importance of what was being said. Another of the many things that had changed over the years. But Remo's fundamental nature had not changed.

"It is not enough to speak the words," Chiun insisted harshly. "You must understand their importance. You are in a difficult time now, Remo. In the book of Sinanju are the names of many good Masters who failed but once and paid with their lives, for such is the price of failure even for those from Sinanju. Yet you are more fortunate than Master Pak, who lost his life to the drinkers of blood. Or the second Lesser Wang, who was the first Master of Sinanju to encounter the dreaded succubi of the Nile. Or Master Tup-Tup, who was defeated on his first day as Reigning Master-yes, his first day-by the unholy magics of a Dravidian conjurer. You are blessed because you have their lessons, often learned in blood, to guide you. And, praise the Great Wang, you have prophecies like this one. Listen to them, learn from them.

But do not think yourself invulnerable because you benefit from the wisdom of the ages. You are not the end of history. It will take but one time, Remo-one fatal moment-for you to become an eternal lesson for all the Masters who follow you."

With that, he released his grip on Remo's arm. Turning, his eyes slivered as he scanned the woods to his left.

Remo felt the heavy sense of dread that came like waves from the frail form of his teacher. When he spoke, his own words were filled with soft reassurance.

"I'll remember, Little Father," he vowed.

Chiun didn't take his eyes from the nearby trees at the side of the road.

"Good. Do not forget it when some new daydream flits through your wandering mind. Prepare."

And the creatures appeared from the forest.

They came up all around. As if possessed of a single mind, they passed out of the thorny underbrush on either side. Low to the ground, they came onto the road.

"Stay alert," Chiun cautioned. Spinning, he pressed his back to Remo's and raised his hands. Ivory nails like shards of sharpened bone were directed at their stalkers.

Remo matched his teacher's pose. Senses stretched far out around them, he watched the creatures exit the woods.

Growling and hissing they came. They came and came until the road was clogged forward and back, blocking advance and retreat. Even though there were more males than females, the females seemed dominant. In each of the small groups the males stayed close to a single female.

As they circled, Remo searched the sea of faces for Judith White.

She might look different. He was prepared for that. The same formula that had made her the monster that she was could be used to alter appearance. Remo had seen it before. But Judith White was more than just a face. She wouldn't need to look the same for him to sort her from the pack.

In the sea of movement he detected not a single female that carried itself in quite the same way as Judith White.

Despite his disappointment, one woman caught his eye.

She was off to one side, watching intently. A hint of malicious glee brushed her beautiful face.

"Hey, Chiun, isn't that the chick from New York?" Remo asked, directing his chin toward Elizabeth Tiflis.

The questioning confusion in his voice was matched by the puzzlement on the face of the Master of Sinanju.

"It is," Chiun said, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

"How would she know to come here?" Remo asked.

ELIZABETH TIFLIS SENSED that she had drawn the attention of both men. She found her way to the head of the massive pack. Feline eyes settling on Remo, she extended a lazy finger his way. And the words she spoke surprised both Masters of Sinanju. "You," Elizabeth announced. "It's about time you got here. You're wanted inside."

And the animal purr of satisfaction that rose from deep in her throat chilled the spring morning.

Chapter 21

"Excuse me?" Remo asked. He shot a glance at the Master of Sinanju. Chiun's expression was stone.

"Don't waste my time, sugar," Elizabeth warned. "Get down on the ground now and you'll get out of this alive. Of course, I've seen you in action so I know enough not to take any chances. For our own protection, we'll have to make it so you can't harm us. A few broken bones, cut hamstrings. But I promise you'll live."

One of the males nuzzled Elizabeth's hand. His eyes were trained on the Master of Sinanju.

"What about the old one?"

She smiled. "Use him as a scratching post."

Remo frowned at Elizabeth. "What do you want with me?"

"Me?" Elizabeth replied. "Nothing. If it was up to me, you'd be nothing more than a meal. But this isn't my show. So do we have a deal? Or do we take you down the hard way?"

Remo's face steeled. "I don't deal with vegetables, minerals or animals."

"Suit yourself."

A subtle nod. The pack began to close in.

Elizabeth was the focus for those in front. The others circled in around her. Following her moves, mirroring them. The same was true for the larger groups. Eyes flicked from prey to their respective leaders and back again.

In the pack to the left, Remo spied three familiar faces.

The TV homemaker had found a pair of work gloves in the bottling plant. She thought they would be a pair of good things that would keep her hands clean for craft work, vegetable gardening or everyday disemboweling. Unfortunately she'd misplaced one. If she had looked a bit closer at her neighbor, she would have noticed a suspiciously glove-shaped bulge near the AA brassiere of the kleptomaniac actress.

Behind all of the others lurked Bobby Bugget. The singer seemed as out-of-place as he did frightened. At the front of the closing pack, Elizabeth nodded to the Master of Sinanju.

"He looks even stringier in daylight. Looks like we'll be cleaning our teeth on your bones, Grandpa." Chiun's neck craned from the collar of his simple black robes, offering a tempting target.

"You are welcome to try, perversion of creation," the old Korean replied.

Smiling, Elizabeth stopped abruptly, still several yards shy of Remo and Chiun.

"Don't assume just because a species is new that it's necessarily stupid," she warned cryptically.

Her dark eyes flickered for an instant to the blind spot beside Remo and Chiun.

Remo nodded, a tight smile on his thin lips. "And don't assume that just because a species has been around the block a few times, it can't hear what's going on right behind it."

And as he spoke, the thing behind him lunged. Remo caught the flicker of movement, felt the pressure waves as it flew for his throat.

Without looking, he reached out and plucked the creature from the air. Forward momentum brought it up and around. Its spine cracked loud against the toe of Remo's loafer.

The creature exhaled like a punctured air mattress. "Chalk one up for Homo sapiens," Remo said, tossing the carcass aside.

A thrill of fear and confusion rippled through the frozen ranks. It culminated in the full-throated roar that rose from deep in the belly of Elizabeth Tiflis.

As one, the pack charged. Remo and Chiun became swirling blurs in their midst.

Long claws tried to rake Remo's throat. He redirected the talons into the soft belly of a charging male. The television housekeeping expert tried to lash Chiun with her gloveless hand. Animal rage became incomprehension when her arm came back, minus the hand.

She howled in pain at her bloody wrist stump, which, as far as she was concerned, was the very worst of bad things. The cry of terror and animal fury lasted only as long as it took Chiun's long nails to pierce her forehead.

More creatures flooded in. Dozens upon dozens crushed toward the two men in the center of the maelstrom, all fangs and claws and hissing evil.

A male vaulted over the rest in a dizzying leap, paws extended, mouth eager to tear out Chiun's throat.

Chiun's flashing nails-more sturdy and lethal than any mere hunting blades-speared the creature in midflight. Ivory talons opened skin and muscle.

When the male flipped in midair, landing on feet and knuckles, the soft impact of its body caused his exposed organs to flop to the road. He joined them an instant later.

At the Master of Sinanju's side, Remo caught the nearest with a spinning toe to the chin. Vertebrae cracked like snapping twigs.

A thrum of uncertainty washed through the pack. The leaders had already begun to fall back. With them was Elizabeth Tiflis, fear wide on her ashen face.

This should not have been happening. She had been too busy making her escape back in New York. She hadn't seen enough. She had assumed that sheer numbers would overwhelm these two. Yet here they were, darting left and right. More bodies fell before their flashing hands.

Elizabeth was ready to concede defeat, ready to run for the safety of the woods. But to her great relief just as she was about to make a dash for the underbrush, there came from the forest a terrible, ungodly roar.

It was like thunder from the depths of Hell, echoing through the Maine woods. At the frightful sound, birds in treetops took terrified flight, scattering to the heavens.

On the road, Remo and Chiun felt a new fear wash over the dozens of gathered creatures. It was terror mixed with reverence. Heads lowering to sniff the ground, the beasts ceased their attack. One by one they fell away, passing to the sides of the road.

The underbrush deep in the woods cracked and snapped as something made its way toward the road. Whatever it was wasn't small. The ground shook with pounding footfalls. For a moment Remo wondered if Judith White had found a petri dish of Tyrannosaurus DNA. And as the thought flitted through his mind, the trees finally parted and the unseen behemoth stomped out onto the road.

An awed, frightened hush fell over the other creatures.

Remo glanced from the monster on the road to the Master of Sinanju and back again. He put his hands on his hips.

"You gotta be greasing my pan," he said at last, shaking his head in disbelief at the sight of the world-famous boxer.

The Weiss and Associates client had abandoned the rest of the creatures. He had been stalking the woods for the past day, only to be drawn out by the sounds of fighting.

"This is a terrible situation that you have unwantingly rendered upon my quietude," admonished the boxer loudly, in a voice far too delicate and highpitched for his three-hundred-pound frame. "I will remedy the ignomoronious conflagration by bitin' your noise-making head off."

And with a roar that could be heard from Bangor to Portland, he charged. The earth trembled. Shivering trees rained fragile leaves. The other creatures watched in anticipation.

Remo yawned, checked his fingernails and-when the lumbering behemoth was within striking distance-reached out and snagged the charging boxer by the chin. As the dangling man thrashed, snarled, bit and kicked, Remo turned to the Master of Sinanju.

"See, this is what I'm talking about," he insisted. "I know I'm supposed to be careful and all that, but look." He waggled the snapping boxer in Chiun's face.

The old Korean's expression grew irritated. "Do not point that thing at me. Hurry up and finish it off." Remo remembered a rhyme from childhood that used to work with dandelions.

"Momma had a baby and its head popped off," he recited.

And with a thumb under the chin he proceeded to pop the boxer's head off his shoulders. He bowled it up the road where it got stuck under the front tire of a Dodge.

He held out the body of the boxer, shaking it like a headless Kewpie doll for all the others to see. "Where's Judith White?" Remo demanded.

For an instant, three dozen sets of eyes darted toward the bottling plant. And in the next moment, three dozen sets of legs flew off in every direction.

There was a mass stampede for the woods. Elizabeth and the other pack leaders were first to vanish. Brush crunched under running feet as the creatures rushed to put distance between themselves and the two terrifying humans.

Back near the bottling plant, a lone creature turned tail and ran back for the building.

In a matter of seconds there was only one left on the road. He stood near the Master of Sinanju, shaking fearfully in his clam diggers and Hawaiian shirt.

"Holy guacamole," Bobby Bugget muttered. When Bugget saw Chiun's leathery death mask turn his way, he let out a terrified yelp. Like an Olympic diver who had misplaced his pool, he dove headfirst into the thorny bushes at the side of the road.

"What about that one?" Remo snapped, pointing to the nearby bushes where Bugget's bloodshot eyes stared out in panic.

"Leave it. Come! One has fled to her lair!" Spinning on a black sandal, the old man bounded up the road toward the low concrete building that was the Lubec Springs bottling plant. Remo flew after him.

Behind, Bugget's frightened eyes watched them go. He scanned back from the two fleeing figures to the dead scattered across the road. Howls of fear filled the woods.

"Sweet shit-in-a-shoebox," he gasped.

With a whimper, he began desperately trying to extricate himself from the brambles. Before the two men who were scarier than any old run-of-the-mill half-human tiger returned.

Chapter 22

Moments before Remo and Chiun began racing toward the bottling plant, the object of their wrath slipped through the shadows of the Lubec Springs warehouse.

Dr. Judith White had been drawn from her office by the scent of blood. One silent foot dropped assuredly before the other as she crept across the drafty room.

Her acute sense of smell was focused on the familiar metallic tang that clung, rich and heavy, to the clean Maine air, guiding her to the place of slaughter. Judith padded up to the pool of dark, coagulating blood.

The truck driver's face was wax. Glassy eyes stared at the iron rafters. His chest was an empty red husk. Huge toothy tears shredded the meat of biceps and thighs.

She knew the man. He had come to the plant twice to pick up loads of tainted water. With an angry glare, she noted the wedding ring on the man's left hand.

The ring meant family, meant this human would be missed.

A soft growl formed at the back of her throat. "Idiots," she said to the silent walls.

As if in response to her growl of complaint, the side door of the warehouse suddenly burst open. Owen Grude bounded inside, eyes wide and frightened.

Judith sneered at his approach. So clumsy. Yes, he was stealthy by the pitiful standards of humans, but he was still light-years from being completely like her.

But that was part of the plan. This wasn't about creating an army to combat man. Not yet. Emil Kowalski and Genetic Futures had helped her create a watered-down version of the formula. Without the genetic material that had made her whole, Owen and the rest were not like her.

Owen had yet to shed the extra weight he'd inherited from a lifetime of slothful humanity. Loping, panting, the spring bottler raced up to Judith White. "They're here!" Owen announced.

Her cat's eyes narrowed. "Who?" she demanded.

"The two you told us about!" He glanced back, as if he expected the two men to appear on his tail at any second.

The fresh blood of the dead truck driver had distracted her. Smell conquered all other senses. She redirected her attention to the front of the building.

And she felt it. The thrum of fear from her creatures.

Judith was surprised by her own reaction. She thought she would be cool and ready when the time came. Instead, the oldest animal instinct overcame all else.

Panic washed over Judith White.

"You're certain it's them?" she demanded.

Owen nodded frantically. "They've killed many of us. I barely escaped. What should we do?"

Judith sensed the male's fear. The bottling plant was Owen's den, his shelter. Instinct told him that he would find safety here. But Judith knew that it was only a building. With wide-open doors and easily shattered windows.

"We aren't doing anything," Judith replied. "I'm escaping. And since I know you'll try to follow me..."

Her hand was up faster than he could see. Thick, hard claws attacked. With a violent tear, she ripped the life from Owen's bulging, throbbing neck.

Even as Owen was falling to the floor, Judith was wheeling. Alarm collapsed her pupils to yellow pinpricks of fear as she vaulted to the open loading dock. Nose in the air, she sniffed deeply.

The smell of blood came to her. Soft wind blew from the front of the building to the forest. They were still out front. Out back was woods. The woods were safety.

Powerful legs tensed. Judith flew from the dock to the driveway. She was running the instant her bare feet touched the ground. She headed for the woods. Branches snapped at her face.

Animal instinct she had thought she could control compelled her to put distance between herself and the very men she had schemed to bring to this place. But in her heart she was still an animal and her animal mind screamed flee!

Judith White ran like the wind. Away from those she knew could deal her death.

Chapter 23

The Master of Sinanju avoided the stairs. Sandaled feet left the hard-packed front path and the tiny Asian vaulted to the porch in one bound. Plain black robes billowed around pipe-stem legs. He marched for the door.

By the time Remo flew up to join him, Chiun's hands were already blurs. With sharp strokes of savage fury, he reduced the front door to kindling. Both Masters of Sinanju swept inside the Lubec Springs offices.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary in the foyer. Receptionist's desk and outer offices were empty as they moved deeper into the building.

Each man understood he was facing prey beyond the ordinary. Both strained their already heightened senses to the maximum as they headed along. But though they pressed to feel, they detected no telltale signs of life.

Owen Grude's office door was open. Ever alert, Remo peered inside.

The room was clear. A wide picture window looked out on forest at the rear of the building. There was no sign of Judith White or any of her cubs inside.

"She's not in here," Remo said thinly, ducking back into the hallway.

Chiun's face was dark. Wisps of hair were trembling thunderclouds as the Master of Sinanju turned from his pupil.

The next door they stopped before was closed. An odor came from within. One with which both Masters of Sinanju were all too familiar.

It was the smell of death.

Remo raised a foot, striking hard with his heel dead center in the heavy door. With a shriek, the door whistled around on twisting hinges, burying itself with a vicious crack into the interior wall.

Even before the door struck, Remo and Chiun were sweeping inside.

The scene within was a vision torn from the darkest depths of Hell.

Judith White and her cubs had used the office to nest. Bales of hay stolen from a nearby Lubec farm had been broken open and spread around the floor. Animal smells mixed with the stink of rotting flesh.

The gristle-smeared bones of Burt Solare mingled with bits of dried grass. Tipped back in a carefully arranged hay bed, the grinning skull of the dead cofounder of Lubec Springs stared with hollow sockets at the two Masters of Sinanju.

Near Burt Solare's remains, a second skull peeked timidly from out of the grass. Wet hay clung to broken bone. All that remained of Helen Solare.

Arm and leg bones had been chewed to sharp fragments. They littered the room's damp floor. Against one wall, nestled between a small desk and a filing cabinet, a half-eaten cow carcass lay rotting.

"Puss has been busy," Remo commented with thin disgust as he surveyed the sick tableau.

Chiun's face was impassive.

There was no one in that small room but ghosts. Leaving the dead to their final rest, the two men moved back into the hallway. On the way out, Remo tugged the door out of the wall, swinging it back into place.

The few remaining offices were empty. At the rear of the attached wooden structure was the connecting corridor to the bottling plant and warehouse.

The plant was free of life, as well.

Even before they stepped through the door to the warehouse, Remo had detected the thready heartbeat. It came from behind a stack of cardboard boxes near the open bay door.

He didn't need to ask the Master of Sinanju if he had heard the sound. The old Korean's bright hazel eyes locked in on the source.

The heartbeat was almost but not quite human. It was the heartbeat of one of Judith White's monsters. But it was near death.

Side by side, the two men moved swiftly across the cold concrete floor.

They found Owen Grude tucked back from the main floor, chest rising and falling with shallow panting breaths. He had dragged himself up against a pallet loaded with boxes decorated with the familiar Lubec Springs waterfall logo.

Remo squatted beside him. Owen seemed barely to notice his presence. Now in death's embrace, he had become fully animal. There was little pain. The look on his face was that of a creature confused by its own mortality.

"Where's White?" Remo demanded.

A glimmer of recognition. A flicker in his eyes. Owen shook his head. A fresh gurgle of blood leaked from the claw marks raked across his throat. He tried to snap at Remo's neck, but there was no strength left. With a wet sigh, Owen's head dropped forward.

A final wheeze of fetid air and the creature grew still.

Remo stood. "There's no one else here, Little Father," he said.

The Master of Sinanju sensed nothing, as well. Walking slowly, the two men crossed over to the open door to the loading dock. As they passed, they noted the freshly shredded body of the Lubec Springs truck driver.

Cool air carried the scent of pine as they stepped out onto the concrete platform. Outside, a truck half-filled with cases of Lubec Springs water sat silent.

Dense woods began only a few dozen yards from the back of the building.

Remo began to hop down from the platform, but a bony hand on his forearm held him fast.

"She is gone," Chiun said.

Remo hesitated. "Shouldn't we at least look?" As he spoke, he rotated his wrists in frustration.

"The forest is too vast, and there are too many others like her running through it now, creating false trails. That creature is fast and clever. She would gain distance from us with every step."

The old man released Remo's arm. As the truth of his teacher's words set in, the fight drained from Remo.

"Dammit," he complained. "She got away again." He tore his eyes from the woods, the light of hope dawning. "Maybe we've still got one last shot."

Turning on his heel, he headed back across the warehouse floor.

"OUCH, OWEE, ouch-ouch-ouch."

Thorns dug deep into Bobby Bugget's bare legs. With thumb and forefinger, he gingerly picked them out one by one.

He was still carefully picking when Remo and Chiun appeared from the front door of the bottling plant.

"Crap on a crust!" Bugget shouted.

Thorns forgotten, he ran from the bushes, away from the terrifying men who had slaughtered so many of Judith White's tigers. As he fled, his shoe hooked a root and he went flying face first to the driveway. He landed in a painful slide at the toes of a pair of hand-stitched leather loafers.

Bobby Bugget looked up into a pair of the deadest eyes he had ever seen.

"Oh, hiya," Bugget said. "How ya'll doin'?" He offered a big, disarming Southern smile to Remo and the Master of Sinanju, who stood in the driveway beside his pupil.

"Zip it, Goober," Remo snarled. He grabbed Bugget by the collar of his Hawaiian shirt and dragged him to his feet.

The Master of Sinanju was examining the singer, a look of deep mistrust on his leathery face. "He is not one of the beasts," the old Korean concluded.

Remo had noticed the same thing. Bugget didn't have the same sense of animal stillness or altered heartbeat as the other Judith White victims.

"You were with them," Remo said suspiciously. "Why aren't you one of them?"

Bugget's mustache twitched with his nervous smile. "They tried to turn me. They made me drink that stuff. What's it called?" He snapped his fingers, trying to jog his frightened memory. "You know. What ice comes from."

"Water, you nit," Remo said.

"Yeah, that," Bugget said. He shuddered at the memory. "As a rule I don't drink nothing fish pee in. Anyway, the stuff didn't work on me. Guess they musta thought it did, 'cause they accepted me as one of their own. Kind of like Jane Goodall living with them monkeys over in Africa."

Remo wouldn't need convincing that monkeys would have welcomed Bobby Bugget as one of their own. He had trouble, however, imagining Judith White being quite so accepting.

But as soon as he got a good whiff of Bugget's foul breath, he realized why the singer hadn't been mauled.

Chiun interjected before Remo could speak. "This one has been consuming human flesh," the old Korean accused, face contorted in disgust.

"Hey, even Jane Goodall had to eat a banana every once in a while," Bugget said defensively.

Remo's face was death personified. "Where did she go?"

"She's gone?" Bugget asked, shoulders relaxing. Remo smacked him on the side of the head. Bugget's shoulders tensed up again.

"I don't know where she is," the singer said. "She mostly kept away from the rest of us. Even when she came back to see us, I stayed as far away from her as I could."

"Okay, so what did she want with me?"

Bugget snapped his fingers. "Now, that I do know. I heard her talking to Owen-he's the guy who owns this place. She said something about seeing you in action a couple of years ago, and that you were like no other humans she'd ever seen. She said she tried to turn you into one of her little critters, and that you didn't cooperate."

That was true. In his encounter with Judith White near Boston three years before, she had tried to force Remo to drink some of the formula.

"That's it?" Remo asked. "She wanted to try again?"

"I don't know for sure," Bugget said. "I only know what I heard. It sounded like she was real keen on you."

Remo's lips thinned. "Ten words or less," he said. "Tell me why I shouldn't kill you and let something higher up the food chain than you eat for a month."

Bugget's tan face whitened. He thought very hard. When it came, relief dawned bright.

"Oh." As he spoke, he counted off each individual word. "I ... know ... where ... she ... keeps ... her... genetic..." He paused at the eighth digit. "Hey, old-timer," he whispered to Chiun, "is whatchamacallet one word?"

"Oh, for the love of," Remo sighed, rolling his eyes heavenward.

He grabbed Bobby Bugget by one end of his bushy mustache. With a hard yank, Remo dragged the whimpering singer back across the parking lot to the bottling plant.

Chapter 24

Mark Howard spent several long hours at his office computer in an attempt to find Judith White's lab. But a lengthy, frustrating search through the electronic reaches of cyberspace had yielded no success.

The first thing he had done was check for mysterious deaths which included missing organs or limbs, as Dr. Smith had suggested. Given Judith White's specific needs, he chose to start with the genetics field itself.

Mark had the CURE mainframes go through all unsolved murders for the previous three years in any way connected to genetics research facilities.

He hadn't given this much hope of success. He assumed that the ever vigilant CURE mainframes would have detected a pattern of murders in a particular scientific field.

He was right. The search came up empty.

Mark widened it to include unsolved murders merely in the vicinity of genetics facilities.

Since most labs were located in urban areas, this search generated hundreds of results.

Mark automatically sifted out all shootings, stabbings and anything else that wasn't out of the norm.

This reduced the number to a more manageable several dozen.

When he looked over the list, Mark noted that there was a disproportionate number of stories in the newspaper the Super Nova. Since that particular paper specialized in Bigfoot sightings, Bat-Gal attacks and other improbable news items, he disregarded those articles.

Of the rest there were only a few stories worth noting.

A body in a bad state of decomposition had been found on a hiking trail at Yellowstone National Park three summers before. Like the Judith White victims, the organs had been consumed. Park officials had attributed the death to a bear attack. The local medical examiner had agreed.

A similar story was reported in a local Arizona paper a few weeks after the Yellowstone article. A search for two lost college students had ended in a grisly discovery. The boys' remains were found at their campsite. According to the paper, both had been eaten by wild animals. It was concluded that they were victims of a pack of ravenous coyotes.

That was it. There were other deaths, but after those two cases-for the past two and a half years-there was nothing that fit Judith White's modus operandi.

Although they seemed pretty thin, they were all he had. Mark put both stories in the maybe file. Sighing defeat, he began a more conventional search.

That the formula had been altered wasn't in question. Since Mark had returned to Folcroft, an independent lab had confirmed the GenPlus results. To alter the formula meant access to a laboratory. Mark reasoned that it was possible Judith White was staffing a secret lab somewhere.

He sifted through the personnel records of anyone who had worked for BostonBio or its earlier incarnation, the Boston Graduate School of Biological Sciences. Both had been involved in the research that had altered Judith White's DNA. It was possible that she had found an ally from one of the old research teams.

Much of the personnel had been scattered around the country. Some were in Europe. A few from BGSBS had died or retired. In the end, Mark had nothing more than a list of names. He dumped them into the mainframes for analysis. Maybe the CURE system could find something worthwhile.

Once he was done, Mark leaned back in his chair. His head touched the wall. For a minute, he closed his eyes.

It was like looking for a needle in a haystack. But Judith White's lab had to exist. And since his search had turned up no mysterious deaths or disappearances in the genetics field, it was safe to conclude the lab was still in operation. Judith White's pattern suggested that she would have severed the link once it was no longer useful to her. Which meant that she was keeping it open for some reason.

The thought gave Mark a chill.

A needle in a haystack. But this particular needle was there somewhere, waiting to be found. It was just a matter of weeding through each individual piece of hay to find it.

Opening his tired eyes, Mark looked at the clock in the corner of his computer screen. Just after three o'clock.

His blinds were closed tight on the night. Dawn was still a few hours away.

Climbing out of his chair, Mark stepped out of the office to stretch his legs.

Folcroft was asleep. The lights were off in the administrative wing. The glow of the stairwell exit signs was all there was to guide him. Through a hall window, he saw the nearly empty employee parking lot. His own car was parked in the last space far from the building. It was new, and Mark wanted to avoid parking-lot dings. Dr. Smith's beat-up old station wagon was parked in its usual place-the first spot near the building.

When he saw his employer's car, Mark shook his head.

The assistant CURE director didn't like the thought of Dr. Smith staying at his desk all night. The older man had been through more than his share of crises in his day. He had earned the right to a good night's sleep.

If nothing else, Harold W. Smith was a shining example of dedication.

"I hope I have as much stamina when I'm your age," Mark muttered quietly, leaning on the window frame.

From his vantage he could see down Folcroft's long driveway. Beyond the high walls, a pair of headlights sliced the night. A lone car was making its way up the road.

The driver was likely a Rye resident. How many times had he driven by the open gates of the ivy-covered sanitarium and never given it a second glance? Folcroft had been home to America's most damning secret for four decades, and yet no one in Rye had ever learned the truth.

Another example of the genius of Dr. Smith. When he was first setting up CURE, he had selected the perfect cover. He had not tried to hide out in the middle of nowhere, where remoteness itself might inspire curiosity. Folcroft was sitting right there for all the world to see.

"Hiding in the open," Mark said, yawning.

His tired mind drifted to one of the articles he had glanced at an hour before. Without even thinking, he breathed mist onto the window. One lazy finger squeaked through the fog. It moved automatically. Until he was finished, Mark hadn't been aware he was drawing a picture.

When he was done, Mark blinked.

The image was illuminated by the dull amber glow of the parking-lot lights. Mark's wandering finger had traced a small stick figure in a little dress. The arms were extended wide. Around them he had drawn a pair of bat's wings.

Judith White was highly intelligent. She'd know enough not to leave a visible trail. But if Dr. Smith's information was correct, she couldn't curtail her appetites. She would have to mask them. Hide them.

Make them look like something other than what they were.

Mark looked at the picture once more. It was fading now. As the fog evaporated, the wings disappeared. The bat creature he had drawn became a girl once more.

All at once, something clicked in Mark Howard's brain. Like the melting fog on the windowpane, his weariness fled.

"Hiding in the open," he repeated.

It was so obvious he was angry for not having seen it. And if he was right, he might have just narrowed the search for Judith White's secret lab.

Feeling the thrill of discovery, Mark turned on his heel and raced back up the dark hall.

THE WARM LIGHT of the rising sun brushed over the threadbare carpet, illuminating the figure asleep on the old leather sofa. The scattering night shadows were slinking slowly off into dusty corners as Harold W. Smith sat up.

Smith had stayed at his desk until the middle of the night, stealing just a few hours' sleep before dawn.

He checked his cheap Timex. Six o'clock on the dot.

He wasn't concerned that he had missed any fresh news.

As was his habit on those other rare instances when he had taken a few hours to sleep on his office couch, Smith had set his computer to beep loudly if the mainframes learned anything new. Mark Howard was also in the building. Since neither Mark nor his computers had awakened him, Smith assumed the crisis hadn't worsened.

Before checking the latest computerized digests, he allowed himself the luxury of a trip to the bathroom. Ten minutes later, freshly shaved, teeth brushed and wearing a clean white shirt, he settled in behind his desk.

The screen-saver function switched off the moment his hands brushed his keyboard. As if on cue, a new message popped up on his screen. It was from Smith's assistant.

Smith opened the file. When he saw the contents, his brow sank low.

"What the devil?" he said to the empty room. He was still frowning a moment later when his office door opened.

Mark Howard hurried in, face flushed with excitement.

"Is this supposed to be a joke?" Smith asked, indicating his computer with a tip of his head. If it was a joke, his tone made it clear he wasn't amused.

Mark shook his head. "I think I found her," he blurted as he came across the room. "Or, rather, her pattern. She's been there all along, Dr. Smith. Right under our noses. Exactly like you thought. Did you have a chance to look at any of that stuff I sent?"

"Mark, most of these articles are from-" Smith paused, searching for the right word "-a questionable source."

"That's the most ingenious part," Mark insisted. "She's hiding right out in the open. We've all even heard stories about her victims, but no one's connected the dots."

Smith glanced down at his monitor. When he saw the first article listed, he arched an eyebrow. The source was the Super Nova, a Florida-based supermarket tabloid.

"I do not understand."

Mark stopped next to Smith so that he could see the angled monitor. The young man was wired from lack of sleep.

"See that?" he said, pointing to the first article. "Open that one." He continued talking as Smith clicked open and began scanning the first article. "The story is probably familiar to you. There have been stories like it making the rounds the past few years. See, people get picked up in bars, or wherever. Doesn't matter where. The point is, they get taken back to a hotel thinking they're in for some fun. At some point someone slips something in their drink to knock them out. When they wake up, it's the next day and they're sitting in a bathtub filled with ice. And there's a note saying that they'd better call an ambulance because their organs have been harvested during the night."

Smith took his eyes off the article. He was beginning to think that his assistant was in need of a vacation. "That seems highly dubious," he said cautiously.

"It is," Mark insisted. "It's just an urban legend. People trading in black-market organs. Nobody in their right mind believes it's true. That's what's so perfect about it. Did you read the first story?"

Smith had scanned it as Mark spoke. The article from the Super Nova was written by a reporter named Allison Braverman. She gave an account of an incident essentially the same as the one Mark had just told Smith. According to the tabloid, a body packed in ice had been found in a motel bathroom in Denver. However, this story had a more plausible ending than the one Mark had related. The victim had died.

Smith glanced up over the tops of his glasses. "Mark," he began, "you cannot expect a supermarket tabloid to-"

Mark shook his head. "Next one down," he interrupted. "It's an actual report from the Denver police."

Smith clicked on the highlighted line. As he read along, his expression grew more surprised. The report told the same basic story as the tabloid. A body had indeed been discovered. The murder was unsolved. When Smith was finished, he looked up at his assistant in amazement.

"It actually happened," he said.

"Not just once," Howard said. "Dozens of times. See?" He pointed at the list of articles from the Super Nova. "All these are similar cases. Same story. Guy dead in a bathtub filled with ice, organs missing. I verified each one of them with the local police. Every single one happened. The FBI is even tracking it. Except they think they've got a run-of-the-mill serial killer on their hands."

Smith couldn't believe what he was hearing. If this was true, it was operating so far below the radar that even CURE's computers had overlooked it.

"Why did this not make the legitimate papers?"

"It did," Mark said. "As far as that first story is concerned, the Denver Post ran it the next day. But the wire services didn't pick it up. I think they weed out this sort of thing. They're too savvy to run stories about dogs with burglar's fingers stuck in their throats or old people setting the RV on cruise control and then going in the back to make tea. Those are urban legends, too, just like this. Nobody suspected this one was real because they'd already heard it a hundred times. Editors killed it thinking it was a con job or tabloid junk."

Smith absorbed in his assistant's words. He had to admit it was clever, in a perverted way. However, on its own it was hardly conclusive.

"Mark, this alone does not implicate Judith White."

A tired grin surfaced on Mark's pale face. "There's more. May I?" He indicated Smith's computer keyboard.

The CURE director leaned back in his chair, allowing his assistant access to the keyboard. Mark typed quickly, closing out the first file. He pulled up another. A fresh list of articles appeared, these ones from the Super Nova, as well. He pointed to the top one.

"Get a load of that," he said triumphantly. Adjusting his glasses on his patrician nose, Smith peered at the screen. The title of the new article, also by the Braverman woman, read Mysterious Cattle Mutilations Continue! Are Aliens to Blame? There was a long list of similar livestock stories. The headlines were each dated chronologically. Not one was more than three years old.

"I assume you've confirmed these, as well?" Smith asked.

Howard nodded. "For some reason-I have no idea why-the space-alien conspiracists think Kang and Kodos are flying all the way from Ork to chop up our cows. The articles about cattle mutilations are like crop-circle stories. They tend to get spiked by the legitimate press, too, since most editors put them in the same category of tabloid trash."

"And you believe Judith White is responsible for these, as well?" Smith said, nodding to the list of articles.

Mark attacked the keyboard once more. The folders of articles disappeared, replaced by a map of the United States.

On the map was a series of small circles shaded in dark red. Each of the small circles was surrounded by a larger pink circle. A date appeared within each of the concentric circles.

"These small circles are the cases where men were found dead in hotel bathtubs," Mark said excitedly, pointing to the smaller dots. "Farther out is where the cattle mutilations took place. Notice the dates."

Smith had already seen the pattern. In every set, the dates within the smaller and larger circles each took place within a month or two of each other. The dead men and cattle were killed at roughly the same time.

The circles moved slowly around the country. There were sets in virtually every state. They'd crop up for a few days, sometimes longer, before moving on to a new location. With a sinking feeling, the CURE director realized that he could have traced the path with his finger. It threaded through the nation in a single, unbroken line. Clearly it was the trail of a single individual on the move.

"My God," Smith said. "She's been here all along."

The excitement of discovery was fading for Mark Howard. The long night was finally beginning to catch up with him. Leaning back against the window frame, he rubbed his tired eyes.

"My guess is that she goes for cattle like fast food. It's not the fancy stuff she craves, but since she can't risk attacking people on the street she settles for good, full meals. They hold her for a month or two. But every now and then the craving gets to be too much for her. When that happens, she stages one of her bathtub specialties. After that she knows she has to move on. One death like that in a single city is dismissed as an urban legend, but two risks public outcries and curfews and added police patrols."

As he surveyed the map, Harold Smith could only shake his head in amazement. It was so obvious, so well researched. He had been impressed by his assistant in the past, but the young man had outdone himself this time.

"Excellent work, Mark," Smith said.

The thrill of discovery had passed, along with Mark's weary grin. There was a grim expression on his wide face as he looked at the map.

"There are two early killings I think are hers," he said, pointing. "Here and here. A couple weeks after she was presumed dead in Boston, a hiker at Yellowstone and two campers were killed in Arizona. Then she got smart. The first bathtub story was some poor pizza delivery guy in North Dakota. After that you can follow her route. But, even though it's been happening pretty much all around the country for the past three years, notice where there haven't been any of these cases."

Smith had noticed. The Northeast was clear of circles.

"She has avoided New England," the CURE director said.

"According to the local paper in Lubec, there have been a bunch of cattle eaten by wild animals up there in the past few days," Mark explained. "I didn't bother to mark those. Assuming she's got some of those monsters running around loose up there, that was bound to happen. But for three solid years, she avoided the Northeast like the plague."

"Hmm," Smith mused. "I would say she was concerned about discovery, at least at the start. Since Massachusetts lived through this twice before, it would make sense for her to avoid that region of the country lest someone make even a tenuous connection as you have. Yet she has made it the focus now." He pursed his lips in thought. "If it was not animal fear that kept her away all this time, I would surmise that she kept clear of the region until she was ready to begin this latest scheme of hers." A fresh thought sprang to mind.

Smith quickly scanned the map. He found several spots where the concentric red-and-pink circles didn't overlap. These in-between areas where Judith White had not left a trail were colored blue. Most were so small as to be insignificant. There were only two large areas shaded in blue. Besides New England, the largest blue spot was an area of California from south of San Francisco all the way to San Diego. The entire lower half of the state was untouched.

"There," Smith announced. "Why has she never gone to Southern California?"

Mark had noticed the blue area as he was making the map.

"I could only come up with two possibilities," the young man said. "It could just be that they lucked out and she left it off her route, or-"

Smith finished his assistant's thought. "Or that is where her lab is located," the older man said excitedly.

"I've compiled a list of facilities in California she might be using," Mark said. "It's still pretty long, but it's a start."

"Very good," Smith said. "We will begin straight away."

As he spoke, one of the two phones on his desk jangled to life. It was the blue contact phone.

As he leaned forward to grab the receiver, Smith's cracked leather chair retained an outline of his body. "Smith," the CURE director said crisply.

"White got away, Smitty," Remo's voice announced.

Smith sat up more straightly. "Explain."

Remo exhaled angrily. "She was here, then she wasn't. Explanation over."

"Was she alone or were there others?"

"There were others, all right," Remo said. "And I know what you're thinking, but there's none left to ask where she might have gone to. The ones that aren't dead scattered like lab rats into the woods. They're probably halfway to Canada by now. But don't worry. As soon as they find out the whole damn country is on vacation thirteen months out of the year on America's hard-earned dime, they'll be back."

"So we still do not know what her ultimate plan was."

"Maybe we do," Remo said. "It's possible she did all this just to get me up here."

Smith frowned confusion. "Explain." "Remember last time how she tried to get me to convert? I must be pretty hard for a gal to forget because I think she staged all this to draw me out. They seemed to be waiting for me. Only this time instead of just her, there was an army. She must have thought there would be strength in numbers."

Smith's mouth felt dry. He wet his lips with his tongue. "If that's true, it is a troubling development, Remo," he said slowly.

"Tell me about it. Beyond that, I don't think we have to stretch it too far for her ultimate goal. She's a consistent DNA-hole. Her turn-ons include world domination, subjugating mankind and Purina People Chow."

Smith shook his head. His face was troubled. "No," he said. "It does not add up. She remained safely hidden all this time. She could have continued to do so indefinitely. I don't think she would bait such an elaborate trap, risking exposure simply to turn you into one of her own. Beyond that the scheme falls apart. The formula is only temporary and does not affect a large enough area of the country." He tapped a hand on his desk. There was something more here. He could feel it in his rock-ribbed New England soul. "It is unfortunate you didn't save one for questioning."

"It was Remo's turn, Emperor Smith," the Master of Sinanju's voice called from the background.

"It's always my turn," Remo complained.

With a weary sigh Smith glanced at his assistant. Mark Howard had left the CURE director's side. The young man was sitting across the desk in his usual chair. He hadn't wanted to interrupt. He was watching Smith anxiously.

"One moment, Remo, while I include Mark in this."

Smith switched over to speakerphone before replacing the receiver. When he sat back, the indentations of his chair accepted his angular frame.

"We do have one guy here, Smitty," Remo said. "He's not one of them, but I still don't think he'll be much help."

An unfamiliar, nasal voice came over the line. "How y' all doin' ?"

"Cork it, pinhead," Remo growled.

"Who is he?" Smith asked.

"Florida's answer to the one-man frat party," Remo said. "He drank the formula but didn't turn into one of them."

"How is that possible?" Smith asked.

"I think it's because he was stewed out of his mind when White gave him that cocktail of hers. Two-hundred-proof blood must kill the stuff or something."

"Yes, that is possible," Smith agreed. "In the first case twenty years ago, the formula was susceptible to all manner of harmful agents. Since Judith White is apparently using a similar version of that formula, high quantities of alcohol in one's system could nullify the effects."

"Great," Remo said. "The only way to beat her is for all of America to get sloshed out of our minds."

"I'll lead the charge," Bobby Bugget volunteered. "Just gimme a musket, a sack of limes and aim me at the nearest liquor store."

"Chiun, do something about Good-Time Charlie, will you?" Remo asked, irritated.

"I am doing this because I want to, not because you ordered me to," the Master of Sinanju replied. Smith heard a vicious slap followed by a loud yelp.

"Thanks, Little Father," Remo said.

"Think you could go a little softer next time, Little Father?" the voice of Bobby Bugget pleaded.

There followed a series of slaps and yelps that faded in the distance.

"That should keep them both busy for now," Remo said. "There's one silver lining in this cloud, Smitty. Bugget showed us where White stashed her case of tiger juice."

Very, very calmly, Smith placed a flat hand on his desk.

"Are you certain?" he asked.

"I didn't test it, if that's what you mean. But it looks like the real deal to me."

"Remo, that could prove to be invaluable. It is possible to trace her lab using the genetic fingerprints within the formula itself. There are labs working to do so right now, but an undiluted form of the formula could prove critical. You should return to Folcroft with the samples at once."

"That might be a problem, Smitty."

"Why?"

"I know you said these things don't home, but is it possible she put some kind of new homing signal in it? One of those things that escaped from jail in New York was up here. I don't think she could have found her way up here by accident, and I doubt White gave directions on the front page of the New York Times. "

Smith tapped a finger on his desk, considering. "We know now that the formula has been altered. The introduction of a single biological imperative from a species indigenous to that region could theoretically affect the instincts of those under the influence of White's formula."

"I'm gonna assume that means yes," Remo said. "So there's our problem."

"I see," the CURE director said. "If there is a migratory instinct, there might be others, perhaps many more, en route to your location. You will have to wait there, at least until we can dispatch authorities in sufficient numbers to deal with whatever may yet arrive in Lubec."

"That's what I figured. So should I UPS this gunk?"

"No. With Judith White still at large, I don't want it to leave our hands." Smith considered only a minute, nodding with certainty. "I'll come for it."

"Dr. Smith."

So engrossed was he in his conversation, Smith had nearly forgotten there was someone else in the room. He glanced up. Mark Howard was standing once more, a determined look on his face.

"What is it, Mark?"

"I'll go," the assistant CURE director said. Smith hesitated. And in that moment of uncertainty, both men knew what passed through his mind. The last time Smith had sent Mark Howard on a simple field assignment, the younger man wound up in a coma.

Smith pursed his lips. "Yes," he said slowly. "That's good of you to volunteer, Mark, but I'm not sure it's necessary."

"Dr. Smith, this is what I'm here to do," Mark argued. "And anyway, it's just courier work. I'll stay in the car until I get there, collect the formula and get out. I won't stop for anyone or anything. Besides, if Judith White is smart, she wouldn't stick around after Remo and Chiun wiped out her protection. It'll be a piece of cake."

Smith allowed a silent moment to pass. "I, er-" he began.

"Listen to the kid, Smitty," Remo interrupted.

At long last, Smith nodded his agreement. "Very well. Remo, Mark will collect the samples. Please wait there for him." He hung up the speakerphone. Smith turned his full attention on his assistant.

"I issued a recall of all Lubec Springs water to coincide with Remo's arrival," he explained efficiently. "At the moment, every shipment is being impounded and destroyed. As far as White's creatures are concerned, our only problem will be existing cases. There will be no new ones. However, if Remo is correct, those that have already been changed might be converging on that area even now. I doubt the numbers are high, since we seem to have caught it in time, but the possibility exists that there are more."

Mark nodded anxiously. "I understand. What if I run into people who've already changed?"

Smith leaned far over, disappearing for a moment behind his desk. He pulled something from his bottom drawer. When he straightened, he held a cigar box in his hands. He placed the box between them.

"They are not people, Mark," Smith said firmly as he opened the box. "Do not forget that for a minute." As he spoke he removed a handgun and holster from the box. Gun in hand, he glanced up. "You don't have one on the premises, correct?" he asked, nodding to the .45 automatic.

Mark's eyes were locked on the weapon. He had a gun that he had used only once while with the CIA. It was stuffed in a sock on the bedroom shelf of his Rye apartment.

He shook his head. "Mine's at home."

"In future it might be wise to keep it at Folcroft," Smith said. He slid the weapon across the desk. "Please put it on in here. My secretary will be arriving soon and I don't want her to see it."

Mark did as he was told. He stripped off his jacket and shrugged on the shoulder holster. Smith's old Army pistol was heavy under his arm as he pulled his coat back on.

"Be careful, Mark," Smith said once he was through.

His assistant nodded. "I'll be back quick as I can," Mark promised.

He was heading for the door when Smith called to him.

"Mark?"

When Howard turned back to Smith, the CURE director's gaze was sharp.

"Misplaced compassion could get you killed," Smith said. "If you do encounter one of them, do not hesitate. Shoot to kill."

"Yes, sir." Nodding sharply, Mark left the room. After the door was closed, the CURE director turned his attention back to his keyboard.

With luck he would find Judith White's lab before Mark returned from Maine. And end this madness once and for all.

Chapter 25

Judith White ran.

Pure, unbridled panic propelled her. The men who had tracked her to Maine inspired a visceral terror in the cold dead center of what had been her soul.

Pine branches slapped her desperately pumping legs. With chopping hands she swatted away those near her face as they sprang up before her.

Feet raced swiftly, surely. Leaping over logs and rocks. A boulder appeared before her. With a bound she was on it. Another leap, and she was on the distant, mossy side. Still she ran.

It was the young one, Remo, who inspired the greater fear. She had used her intellect during their first encounter, had harnessed that part of her that was most human to outthink him. He was strong, but intellectually inferior.

But in the end he had shocked her. Despite his mental limitations, despite his inherent human frailties, he had beaten her.

Remo was some sort of special government agent. He had been sent to stop her before. She was certain before all this began that-once they knew who and what they were dealing with-they would send him again. After all, the survival of their species was too important a thing to entrust to the usual inept human hunters. They would send their best to track and kill her.

She had been right. Every step of the way. Judith's mind-still analytical when called to be-made that conclusion even as she ran blindly through the Maine forest. She had fled the bottling plant only twenty minutes before and she was already miles away from it.

Distance bred safety.

Rationality was breaking through the veneer of panic. The fear was coming under control.

Her lungs and heart pumped in perfect concert, racing streams of altered blood to every modified cell in her body.

A thought sprang wild in the animal mind of Judith White. Her valises!

One moment she was running full-out; the next she had slid to a shuddering stop. Clumps of wet leaves and pine needles gathered around her bare soles.

In her haste to leave the bottling plant, she had left the formula behind.

She could always get more. Emil Kowalski and Genetic Futures could produce another batch in a few hours. But San Diego was on the other side of the country. She had chosen Kowalski partly because he worked far from the Northeast.

And if she had more formula made, then what? She'd had a specific plan here. One that didn't involve mass conversions of humans. Her plan was more insidious.

And most troubling of all, what if they used genetic signatures to link the altered formula at the bottling plant back to Genetic Futures? She'd lose them, Kowalski, everything she'd been working toward.

Alone in the forest, Judith hesitated.

Deep brown eyes tinged with flames of yellow scoured the tiny glade in which she stood, as if the answer to her problem were somehow hidden in birch or pine.

The two men from the government had killed and scattered her entire pride. They were efficient that way. While Judith knew she was better than the lesser creatures she had created, she knew that she couldn't stand up to the government men without assistance. She had hoped that numbers would work in her favor. Even though that plan had failed, she still couldn't let them find the cases.

The scientist that Judith White had once been accepted the conclusion as inevitable.

But the thing that Judith White had become could not quell the fear that pounded strong in her chest. Still, she turned.

Swift feet made not a sound as she ducked back into the depths of the forest, running back in the direction of Lubec Springs.

Chapter 26

"You know, if you fellas would help get me out of here, I can make it worth your while," Bobby Bugget offered slyly.

They were in the Lubec Springs warehouse. Remo had forced Bugget to drag all the bodies from inside and dump them around the loading dock. He hoped to bait a trap for any stragglers who might be arriving late for Judith White's party. But day had fed into night, and so far there had been no takers.

Remo and Chiun sat cross-legged on the floor. Judith White's gray case was at Remo's knees. "Maybe we should switch over to live bait," Remo suggested to the Master of Sinanju. He raised an eyebrow toward Bobby Bugget.

Bugget had been pacing most of the day near the open loading-dock door. His mustache frowned at Remo's suggestion. "That ain't funny," the singer complained.

"Not trying to be," Remo said. "And you can leave any time you like."

"I ain't going out there on my own," Bugget insisted. "Now-no foolin'-name your price and it's yours. Within reason, of course. How 'bout clothes?

My fan shop in Key West sells the finest in official Bird Brain merchandise. I can fix both of you up nice in caps, sweatshirts, cotton Ts." He turned his attention to Chiun. "What do you say, old-timer? You look like you could use some new duds, what with them pajamas you're wearing."

The Master of Sinanju turned a gloomy eye to Remo. "I must wear these drab robes for an entire year, thanks to my ingrate of a son. Unless he has reconsidered and has decided just this once to think of someone other than himself."

"Nope," Remo said, shaking his head. His eyes were trained out the open bay door. "Still just thinking of me. But thanks for asking."

"Do you see?" Chiun demanded of Bugget. "Do you see how he is? Do you see how he treats me? I would not mind the selfishness if it were only directed at me. I have thick skin. But he has an entire village for which he is responsible. Yet does he care?"

"I care," interjected Remo.

"He does not care," Chiun insisted. "If he did, he would not disregard hard-won lessons in favor of ignorance. Yet you try talking to him."

Standing before the old Korean, Bugget tipped his head, as if seeing Chiun for the first time. "You know, old fella, you seem like kind of an interesting character."

"I am fascinating," Chiun replied.

"Don't forget humble," Remo said.

"Yes," Chiun agreed. "You may live ten times your years and never meet another as humble as I." Bugget twisted his lip, chewing on his mustache.

"I think there might be the makings of a song in you."

Remo felt his stomach sink. When he looked over, he saw that the old Korean's face had brightened like a beam of misplaced sunlight in a moonless midnight sky.

"Oh, crap," said Remo.

"Do you really think so?" asked Chiun, suddenly warming to Bobby Bugget.

"Oh, crap," repeated Remo.

"Hush, Remo," Chiun said. "Forgive him, O minstrel. Rudeness is just another of his many failings. Tell me about the song you are going to write about me and are not going to write about Remo."

"I don't know yet," Bugget said. "But a lot of the songs I write are about folks I meet in my travels. I guess that's probably because of how I started out. Years ago I used to do country covers at a little bar in Nashville."

The Master of Sinanju gasped. He held a frail hand to his chest. "Dare I ask? Is it possible that you know the beauteous Wylander?"

This was a country music star for whom Chiun had developed a crush a few years before. She had the biggest hair and the fattest caboose in the Grand Ole Opry. Which, given the competition, was no mean feat. Somehow the Master of Sinanju was able to see past the surface to glimpse some deep, inner beauty. Remo, on the other hand, suspected if you dug that deep into Wylander, you'd strike nougat.

"Wylander Jugg?" Bugget asked. "Sure, I know her. But don't beauteous mean good-looking?" Confused, he looked to Remo for help.

"Don't drag me into this. I thought he was over the Wylander kick." His ear was cocked toward the door. A dark notch settled in his furrowed brow.

"That is because all you think of is your selfish little self," Chiun said. He was listening, as well. Without warning, the two men rose to their feet. Remo scooped up the case of gene-altering formula. Bobby Bugget whirled around them worriedly as the two Masters of Sinanju swept past.

"What is it?" the singer asked.

"Do not concern yourself, my songsmith," Chiun said.

"A car," Remo said. "Probably just our delivery boy. But maybe you better stay back here out of the way just in case the fur starts flying."

Bugget hadn't heard a car. He strained his ears. All at once the soft sound of an approaching engine tickled the far edge of his hearing.

"If it gets as crazy as last time, I don't want this stuff getting spilled," Remo said to Chiun, patting the big case. He glanced around for a good spot to leave it, finally settling for the top of an eight-foot-high stack of bottled-water boxes. He slipped the case up on top just out of sight. "We'll be right back," he promised Bugget.

And with that they were gone. The door to the bottling plant swung shut behind them.

Alone in the drafty warehouse, Bobby Bugget's bare knees knocked anxiously together.

"Nothin' to worry about, Bobby," he promised himself. "Them fellas scared off everything with sense enough to be scared."

For a moment, he looked out the open door, but he found the night too frightening. He looked at a fluorescent light instead. The fluorescent light was friendly. He wondered if there was anything cheerier than a fluorescent light. He decided that on his next gold-selling album he would write a song about the cheeriness of fluorescent lights.

As he stared at the light, he didn't see the glint of yellow that suddenly winked on in the trees outside. Malevolent cat's eyes watched Bobby Bugget's back.

And as quickly as they appeared, they vanished. Absorbed by the night shadows.

Chapter 27

Remo and Chiun slipped through the idle bottling plant.

Soon the place would be crawling with federal agents. Smith would need not hold them at bay much longer. If this long day was any indication, there were few if any more of Judith White's tigers migrating to the Maine woods.

Remo, for one, felt little satisfaction. Most of those who had been victims of the formula would change back, but not soon enough. There would be other murders in the next few weeks. And the cause of it all-Judith White herself-was probably a thousand miles away by now.

Bitterness deep, Remo pushed open the door that led from the bottling plant to the Lubec Springs offices.

They had a clear view straight to the front of the building. One chunk of the door Chiun had demolished hung slack from the otherwise bare frame. Through the opening they saw a car parked near the steps out front.

From the foyer came a nervous heartbeat.

When Remo and Chiun rounded the corner from the hall, they found a familiar figure standing near the empty receptionist's desk, his back to the two Masters of Sinanju.

"If you're going to interrogate the furniture, at least do it with the lights on," Remo said, flipping the wall switch.

Mark Howard wheeled toward them, Smith's heavy automatic clenched in a two-handed grip. He nearly squeezed the trigger as he blinked against the sudden stab of white light.

"Oh," Mark said, breathing a sigh of relief. "Remo, Chiun. I didn't know where you were. I was a little worried when you weren't waiting in front."

"Your concern for our welfare honors us," Chiun said, offering a slight bow.

"The real fun's happening out back," Remo explained. "We've got a trap set. No takers, though. It looks like you didn't have to waste your time coming up here after all."

Mark seemed to relax. With his free hand, he rubbed one tired eye. "I don't mind," he said.

"Yeah? Well, I do," Remo said, pointing at Howard's gun. "You mind putting that thing away? I've seen you in action with one of those before, and I don't feel like searching the woods for any toes you might accidentally shoot off."

Mark seemed to have forgotten the gun. "Oh, sorry," he said, slipping the pistol back in his shoulder holster.

Remo took special note of the weapon. "That Smith's?" he asked with a frown.

Mark nodded. "Mine was at home. He let me borrow it."

"Hunh," Remo said. "I didn't know he'd taken this adoption stuff that far."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Mark asked, puzzled.

The Master of Sinanju interjected. "It means, Prince Mark, that the Emperor smiles favorably on you. A ruler parts more easily with a limb than a favorite sword."

"It's just a gun," Mark said.

"Think what you want, junior," Remo said. "Just remember, Arthur didn't pass Excalibur around as an ass-scratcher for the other knights." He pointed down the hall. "The stuff's in the back."

The three men started up the hall, but as they passed a door, Mark paused. "I should check in with Dr. Smith."

Mark started to push open Burt Solare's battered office door. He stopped the instant he saw the roomful of human bones and bloodstained hay.

"Oh, my," he gasped.

Chiun reached quickly around, pulling the door closed. "There is a telephone in the next room, Regent."

"Was that a- Was that a cow?"

"Some of one," Remo nodded. "You make your call and try to hold down lunch. We'll go get the stuff."

Remo and Chiun headed down the hall. Behind them, the assistant director of CURE pressed a hand to his stomach.

"I think I just turned vegan," Mark Howard groaned to the silent corridor.

HER HEART SCARCELY BEAT as she pressed her chest against the slate roof.

Judith White could will her heartbeat slower. The mastery she had over the muscle kept it from registering to the ears of the two Masters of Sinanju. Even so, she knew luck was with her. Had their attention not been focused elsewhere, they still might have detected her.

An ear cocked to one side, Judith listened.

The two that posed the greatest threat to her began to move away. In a moment, they were gone.

A single, strong heartbeat remained behind.

Judith didn't know what agency they were with, but judging from the conversation she had just overheard, the human that remained below was connected somehow.

Judith had thought her plan was lost. But now-when all she was after was the formula that could link her to Genetic Futures-a new opportunity had presented itself.

Growling with soft delight, she began creeping, paw over paw, to the edge of the roof.

MARK HELD his breath. Fighting the urge to retch, he doubled back to the first office.

When he pushed the door open, light from the hallway spilled into a more inviting environment. The tidy office of Owen Grude was nothing like the ghastly scene he'd just left.

The stench was still in the air. His breathing shallow, Mark went over to the desk and switched on the light.

The wide picture window that overlooked the desk reflected the bright office interior. Beyond the gleaming pane, the cold Maine evening menaced the trees.

Sitting in Owen Grude's chair, Mark dialed the special Folcroft code on the old-fashioned rotary phone. It was answered on the first ring.

"Smith," the CURE director said tartly.

"Dr. Smith, Mark. I just got here a few minutes ago."

"What is the situation?"

Mark was looking out the window. The woods were disappearing, swallowed up by the night. He thought of every jungle movie he'd ever seen as a, kid.

"It's awfully quiet out there," he said.

"That's good, I suppose," Smith said. "We'll have a clear field to send in other agencies to inspect the premises. Perhaps they'll turn something up in regard to White's lab."

"No luck yet?"

"No," Smith replied. "But it is there somewhere. It's only a matter of time until we find it. Until then, other authorities will have to deal with the creatures that scattered on Remo this morning. Since you left, there have been a few incidents, but nothing major. It seems the fear Remo and Chiun put in them is keeping them away from more populous areas for the time being. We can only hope it remains that way until they either change back or die out."

In the small office, Mark Howard's face darkened at the thought of all of Judith White's innocent victims. "I still want to know what she was doing," he said angrily.

"As do I," Smith said. "I still maintain that it is unlikely this was all done merely to bring Remo over to her side."

"It doesn't make sense," Mark insisted.

"Yes, it does, Mark," Smith replied firmly. "It is important in our work to realize that what makes little or no sense to us has almost always been meticulously planned by those we are up against. I guarantee you, her reasons for executing this plot in this manner make perfect sense to Judith White. We simply have not yet found out the details. Perhaps the answer is still there somewhere. I will have federal authorities go through that facility with a fine-tooth comb as soon as we are finished."

The logic and certainty of the CURE director helped to relieve some of Mark's anxiety.

"Well, I'm finished now," he said. "Remo's getting the stuff. I'm ready to come home. Do you want Remo and Chiun to head back with me?"

"No," Smith said. "It would probably be best to wait until morning. However, I will begin making arrangements for the authorities to move in."

As he sat behind Owen Grude's desk, Mark was beginning to feel cramped. The knee well was smaller than his own. He twisted in his chair. His knee bumped something hidden in the desk's well.

"I'll let them know," he said as he leaned back to see what was tucked beneath the desk.

"Return with the formula as soon as possible. We'll send it out for analysis as soon as you're back." When the phone clicked in his ear, Mark hung up and pushed away from the desk. He tipped his head to get a better view underneath.

Tucked far toward the front was a gray plastic valise, roughly the size of a small suitcase. Getting down on all fours, Mark dragged the case out from its hiding spot. Standing, he placed it in the center of the desk.

Etched in the right corner, two printed Bs were entwined with what looked like a five-rung spiral staircase. A single drawing of a DNA strand.

It was the logo of BostonBio, the company at which Judith White had developed her gene-altering formula. Mark recognized it from his research. Remo and Chiun's source must not have known of the second case.

Feeling the thrill of discovery, Mark popped the silver latches with his thumbs. Inside was lined with waves of soft egg-carton foam rubber. Recessed in smooth compartments in the packing material were six glass vials of brownish liquid.

Mark pulled one loose. Holding it up to the office light, he tipped the vial to one side. Like thick molasses, the gene-recoding substance rolled over the rounded interior of the tube.

"Huhh," Mark said softly. "You look so ordinary."

He watched light glint off the liquid. So engrossed was he, Mark failed to notice that one of the shadows beyond the office window had begun to move.

Mark only realized something was wrong when he heard scratching at his back.

It was gentle. Like a tree branch blown by wind scraping across the office windowpane.

Still holding the vial of formula, he froze. The wind. That was all it was. Still, the sudden appearance of the scratching sound caused his heart to beat faster.

He reached slowly under his suit jacket. Even as he put the vial of formula carefully on the desk with one hand, he drew Dr. Smith's .45 automatic. Gun in hand, he switched off the lamp.

He didn't breathe. Two careful steps brought him to the window. With the lights off inside, he was able to see out more clearly. As he squinted into the dark woods, he saw nothing but the black triangle tops of waving pines.

There was nothing nearby that might have made the noise. The trees were too far away to be the cause. His palm was sweating cold on the pistol's walnut grip. Mark decided it might be wise to find Remo and Chiun.

He was taking a cautious step backward when there came a sudden blur of movement beyond the window. A cold shadow lurched up from the night. A face appeared, twisted in a grinning caricature of humanity.

Judith White's piercing yellow eyes locked on his. Mark's heart tightened. He whipped the gun up to fire.

And then the world exploded all around him as the big picture window came crashing down like a curtain of doom onto the floor of the small office.

"IT WAS right here," Remo said.

From the top of the stacked cases of water, he glanced around the warehouse. The bay door was still open on the night. The case of formula was nowhere to be seen.

"Forget your nonsense," the Master of Sinanju demanded. "Where is my songsmith?"

"Bugget's the least of our worries right now."

"Spoken like a jealous someone who was not about to have a hymn written extolling his greatness and sung by the comely Wylander. Did you frighten him off? Tell me, Remo, why do you find it so difficult to get along with people?"

"I had the world's greatest teacher," Remo said, hopping from the bottle stack down to the floor. "Jealous, selfish and hateful. I will remember that for your headstone, as well."

The Master of Sinanju's muttered complaints were stopped only by the muted sound that carried to their hypersensitive ears from the other end of the complex. "What the hell was that?" Remo asked.

"It sounded like a window breaking," Chiun replied.

The next noise that came to them needed no explanation.

A gunshot.

Exchanging troubled glances, the two men took off at a full sprint across the warehouse floor.

JUDITH WHITE POUNCED into the room behind shards of scattering glass. Mark's bullet missed her by a whisker. His first chance proved to be his last.

Judith grabbed his forearm, slamming his gun hand against the wall. He struggled to hold on to the weapon.

If he could turn the barrel just a little. Get one clear shot.

Judith squeezed his wrist. Mark's hand popped open and the gun fell with a heavy thud to the glass-strewn floor.

A hand too fast to follow snatched Mark by the throat.

Mark grabbed at her arm with both hands, trying to tear it away. It was too tight. It wouldn't budge. His oxygen was going. He was becoming light-headed. He saw Judith White reach out with her free hand. She grabbed up the vial Mark had left on the desk.

Popping the top with her thumb, she dipped the tip of her tongue into the thick liquid. Swishing saliva, Judith brought her mouth close to his. Her breath was vile.

"How about a kiss, darling?" Judith purred.

Her free hand pried open his mouth. It was easy now. The fight was gone. Even as his lips formed an O she was already spitting the sickly warm goo onto Mark's tongue.

She slammed his mouth shut and massaged his throat.

He knew he should resist. But the urge to swallow came anyway. She eased up the pressure just a little, and Mark felt the thick liquid slide down his constricting throat.

The world began to spin. She whispered a few quick words in his ear before letting him go.

As he fell against the desk, he caught a final glimpse of Judith White. She was crouching on the windowsill, the heavy BostonBio lab case dangling lightly from her hand.

She flashed a toothy smile.

"Be seeing you, precious," she growled. And then she was gone.

Mark reeled. Somewhere deep within him, he felt a terrible, primal stirring. His stomach clenched. He pressed both hands to his gut, trying to hold back the pain, desperately trying to hold on to himself.

His head whirled. The room danced a kaleidoscope across his double vision. Through it all, one thought passed over and over through his mind.

One arm. Remo said she had one arm. This Judith White had two.

They don't know. I have to tell them. Have to warn them.

But it was too much. Mark Howard felt all that made him human slip gently away. He fell. On the way to the floor, his temple cracked hard against the corner of the desk.

And a darkness greater than the cold, collapsed center of a dead universe washed over him.

Chapter 28

Remo and Chiun felt the draft of forest air the instant they burst into the Lubec Springs offices.

They raced up the hall to the open office door. The picture window was gone-shattered in a million pieces across the floor. A few shards stuck from the window frame like crooked teeth.

Afraid Mark Howard had been kidnapped, Remo bounded across the floor to the window. He nearly tripped over the young man. Howard was sprawled on the floor behind the desk.

Because Remo had not detected him the instant he entered the room, he was certain Howard was dead. But all at once, the younger man came back to life.

Howard sucked in a pained gasp of breath. Like a newborn testing its first gulp of air. His heartbeat seemed to reset. Like tumblers in a safe, the muscle fell click-click into a new pattern.

Remo had heard the pattern before. "Christ," he hissed.

On the floor, the assistant CURE director stirred. Remo glanced worriedly at Chiun. Standing somberly beside the desk, the Master of Sinanju looked down on Howard, his face gathered in a mask of wrinkled worry.

Remo had hoped he was wrong. But with the look on his teacher's face, his worst fear was confirmed. "Watch him," Remo snapped.

In a shot, he was up on the windowsill. Loafer soles disturbed not a single fragment of glass as he launched himself outside.

He hit the backyard at a sprint.

It was mostly rotting leaves on scraggly weeds. Howard's attacker would have been easier to track through fresh grass, but there was no back lawn to speak of.

Here some leaves had been recently overturned. Over there something had kicked a stone.

Judith White was good. Judith White would not leave big, blundering tracks.

By the time Remo reached the tree line, he knew it was hopeless.

There were tracks in and out of the woods. Some a few days old, some as new as that day. White's creatures probably used the woods as cover for their nightly forays to the local dairy farms. He found a path that looked as if it could have been broken recently.

No, not her. Too old. Too clumsily formed. Maybe with Chiun they could each go in a different direction. Expand their range by fifty percent.

But Chiun had his hands full. Remo was forced to admit defeat.

Running back to the building, he bounded back through the broken window.

Chiun was kneeling on the floor beside Mark Howard. The cushion had been removed from Owen Grude's office chair. The Master of Sinanju had tucked it gently under Howard's head. A nasty red welt was rising on the young man's temple.

"She got away," Remo said, slipping up beside Chiun. He crouched beside his teacher.

"We must hie to Fortress Folcroft at once," the old Korean intoned solemnly.

"You put him under?"

Chiun shook his head. "There was no need. The Regent sleeps for now. But he is gravely afflicted." As if to offer proof, a withered finger brushed Mark Howard's right eyelid. Folding back the thin flesh, the old man exposed an orb of twitching brown. All the green in the young man's iris was gone. When Chiun looked up once more, his mouth was a razor slit of worry.

On the floor, a soft sound came from the back of Mark Howard's throat. It was a contented purr.

Chapter 29

Dr. Lance Drew had seen much that was strange during his tenure at Folcroft Sanitarium.

There had been the time many years before when the old Asian-who was either an acquaintance of Director Smith or a former patient; Dr. Drew could never figure out which-had succumbed to a hitherto unknown viral infection. Somehow he had been miraculously cured by a simple electric shock.

That was one for the medical books.

Then there were those dark days ten years back during a highly stressful IRS raid when mass hallucination had caused people within Folcroft's ivy-covered walls to see purple pterodactyls and pink bunnies. Dr. Aldace Gerling, head of psychiatric medicine at Folcroft, had wanted more than anything to present that episode at a national conference. His request had been denied. Folcroft's privacy policy.

Then there was the comatose girl whose brain showed no signs of synaptic activity whatsoever. Even so, the night she was brought in, Dr. Drew swore he heard her muttering in a voice that sounded like that of a thousand-year-old man. Not only that, her body reeked of a sulfur stench that would not wash away. And to compound the strangeness of that case, for a time the girl's body had released clouds of noxious yellow smoke. That had long since stopped, but the girl was still on the premises. Clearly she was a candidate for the supermarket tabloids. Any one of them would have made her their cover story.

In that as in each case, Dr. Smith would hear none of it. The families of Folcroft's patients, Smith maintained, had not entrusted the care of their loved ones to Folcroft so that their tragedies could be exploited or sensationalized.

There were times in the past when this stubbornness of Dr. Smith had almost driven Dr. Drew to resign. Nowhere else in medicine were healers forced to sign a draconian gag order like was required of the medical staff at Folcroft. At any other institution, he would be able to talk and write freely. But, unfortunately for a man as intellectually curious as Dr. Lance Drew, there was no other place he knew of on the planet that offered such fascinating cases as Folcroft Sanitarium.

And the best benefit of all, for the most part when he left work at the end of the day, he could put it all behind him. The sanitarium ran with such efficiency, thanks to its priggish director, that rarely was Dr. Drew bothered by work at home.

Folcroft Sanitarium was far from his mind as picked up the jangling kitchen phone in his Milford, Connecticut, home.

"Hello," he said absently. With the tip of his tongue he stabbed at the tiny bits of steak and corn that were stuck between his front teeth.

Dr. Drew had just picked up a new Barbecue King 3000 at the local hardware store. He had been enjoying a late supper with his wife, burned with his own two doctor hands.

He had assumed it was one of his grown children. Drew was surprised by the voice on the other end of the line.

"Dr. Drew, there is an emergency at Folcroft," the tart voice of Harold Smith said. "I need you here immediately."

Lance Drew could not remember Director Smith ever calling him at home before. Drew had been helping his wife do the dishes. When he glanced at her, she saw the look of concern on his fleshy face. "What's wrong?" Drew asked into the phone.

"I'll tell you when you arrive. Please hurry." The phone clicked in Drew's ear.

Lance Drew felt a tingle in his ample gut. Another odd case. Had to be. It was the only explanation for Smith's troubled tone and the fact that the Folcroft director was personally calling him back to work.

"Sorry, hon," Drew said, tossing the wet dishrag in his hand to the counter. "Duty calls."

Grabbing up his jacket from the hallway coat rack, he hurried out the front door.

FORTY MINUTES LATER, Dr. Drew was on the sprawling side lawn of Folcroft, Director Smith at his side. Smith's rimless glasses were trained on the southern midnight sky.

It had gotten much cooler since Drew had left work at five. Long Island Sound churned cold and foamy white at the shore. Drew could just see the old boat dock behind the building. It rose and fell with the waves.

Wind whipped across the water and up the back lawn of the sanitarium to where the two men stood. Dr. Drew's hands were shoved deep in his pockets. He was wiggling his cold fingertips when the rumble finally sounded in the distance.

The wind almost covered it. When the Navy helicopter appeared over the dancing trees, it did so in a shock of sound. Claws of yellow searchlights raked the grass.

As soon as the lights found Director Smith and Lance Drew on the side lawn-a pair of orderlies waiting with a stretcher behind them-it lowered quickly to the ground.

Even as the aircraft settled to its wheels, Dr. Smith was running toward it. The howling downdraft from the rotors blew his thinning hair wildly.

Dr. Drew and the others hurried in behind him. Before any of them could reach the helicopter, the side door slid open. Two men Drew recognized from his years at Folcroft jumped to the ground. One was a young Caucasian; the other was the ancient Asian who had suffered the mysterious viral infection years before.

"It looks bad, Smitty," the younger one said. Although he didn't seem to shout, his voice was crystal clear over the helicopter noise.

The sanitarium director barely acknowledged the presence of the two men.

"Stand back," Smith demanded, straining to be heard over the roar of the blades. He waved for the orderlies to hurry.

The patient was lying inside the helicopter. Scampering inside, the two Folcroft attendants strapped him to the collapsible stretcher. Only when the man was brought out onto the lawn did Dr. Drew get a good look at him.

His jaw dropped. "It's Mr. Howard," he gasped. Folcroft's assistant director was unconscious. A large purple welt colored one temple. His wide face twitched with spastic tics.

Smith's steel-gray eyes fixed on Drew's. "Treat him," he commanded.

Drew quickly recovered from his initial surprise. He spun to the orderlies. "Get him inside!"

Dr. Drew ran alongside the two men as they crossed back to the sanitarium.

"Smitty, I-" Remo began.

"Later," the CURE director snapped. Without a backward glance at his enforcement arm, he ran after the others.

As the Navy helicopter was lifting off, Dr. Lance Drew was flinging open the side door of the facility. Running up behind, Smith grabbed the door from him, ushering the doctor and the others hastily inside. He ducked in behind them.

There was nothing more Remo and Chiun could do.

Faces as cold as the wind from the Sound, the two men glided across the lawn and slipped inside the big building.

Chapter 30

The examination took more than half an hour. Harold W. Smith watched every second of it, face drawn in lines of paternal concern.

Even before Dr. Lance Drew finished the exam, he knew his original assumption had been correct. This was an unusual case. But while unusual, it wasn't unique. Dr. Drew was certain this was connected to the still unexplained incidences in New York and elsewhere.

When he was through, the doctor instructed an attending Folcroft nurse to draw additional blood for testing. As the woman did as she was instructed, Drew was pulling off his latex gloves. He stepped across the small examination room to his anxious employer.

"This man should be in a hospital," Dr. Drew insisted in a hushed tone.

Smith shook his head firmly. "Folcroft is adequately equipped for his needs, Doctor."

"I don't even know what his needs are." Drew shot a troubled glance at Mark Howard. "There's been a rash of cases like this in the past few days."

A thought occurred to him. "I assume you've read about them?"

Dr. Drew didn't mean to insult, but Director Smith gave the impression of a man not fully in touch with the events of the everyday world. Drew wanted to be certain that Dr. Smith knew what they were dealing with here.

"I am aware of what is going on," Smith said icily.

"Oh. Well, then you must know that this is more than we can handle here."

"I know nothing of the sort," Smith replied tartly. "Folcroft certainly has enough room for one more patient. And as I understand it, none of those other cases have been cured. Those afflicted like Assistant Director Howard have been sedated and warehoused in other hospitals pending a cure."

"That's true," Drew agreed slowly, "but if there is a breakthrough-"

"Then and only then will we send Mr. Howard for treatment if need be," Smith interrupted. "Until that time, Folcroft takes care of its own."

Dr. Drew could see there would be no arguing. "Very well, Dr. Smith," he sighed. "But given what we know of those other cases, I insist we keep him under heavy sedation."

Dr. Drew nodded to the sleeping form of Mark Howard. He raised a bushy white eyebrow when he saw that the crazed twitches that had afflicted the young man since his arrival had stopped. A nurse continued to fuss over the unconscious young man.

"I not only agree, I insist," Smith said. "Do it. And report back to me hourly on his condition."

With that the Folcroft director left the room.

As the big examination room door sighed softly shut, Dr. Drew watched through the window as the gaunt, gray man hurried up the sterile hallway of Folcroft's security wing.

The creases of Dr. Drew's pronounced frown lines deepened. His employer had an unerring ability to make the greatest physician feel like a lowly janitor. Drew dismissed the thought the moment it passed through his mind.

"That's not true," Lance Drew muttered. "He treats the janitors around here like he cares whether or not they quit."

Grunting unhappily, he turned to the nurse.

"I need a walk. I'll be back with the patient's sedatives in a minute."

"Yes, Doctor."

Drew pushed open the door and stepped out in the hall.

Across the room, unseen by either Dr. Lance Drew or the Folcroft nurse, a pair of yellow predator's eyes peered at them both through razor slits.

Chapter 31

Eileen Mikulka's thumbnail was bitten nearly down to the quick. Nerves, she thought as she chewed the ragged end. All nerves. All because of the terrible news.

Smith's secretary had been a nervous wreck ever since she'd found out that poor Assistant Director Howard had been brought back to Folcroft by some sort of emergency life-flight helicopter.

Mrs. Mikulka normally went home at five. But two long-term Folcroft patients had recently passed on and, as was her custom, Smith's secretary had dutifully retired their files to the storage room in the basement.

While downstairs earlier that week she had unhappily noted the condition of the rest of the patient records. It had been years since she'd given them a good going-over. She had gotten permission from Dr. Smith to stay on after normal business hours a few days that week to clean up the basement files.

She had been coming up from downstairs when she heard the frightful ruckus out on the lawn. There was a helicopter and flashing lights and a stretcher being hurried inside.

A night-duty nurse had told Mrs. Mikulka that the patient was that nice young Mr. Howard.

Fraught with concern, Mrs. Mikulka had returned to her own office. But she had been in such a distracted state she couldn't seem to keep her mind on work.

Now, forty-five minutes later, the plump, middle-aged woman puttered from desk to corner filing cabinet, not sure what she was even doing.

This was the state she was in-beside herself with worry, seemingly lost in her own office-when Dr. Smith came hurrying in from the hallway, his face drawn.

Smith seemed surprised to see his secretary still at work so late after five.

"Oh, Dr. Smith, how is Mr. Howard?" Mrs. Mikulka asked.

"Mark is fine," Smith said brusquely. "At the moment he is resting comfortably."

He tried to sidestep her, but the distraught woman wouldn't let him to his office.

"The poor dear. He hasn't had much luck since he started working here, has he? Someone said he has that awful thing on the news. The thing that made those people do those terrible things earlier today. It isn't that, is it?"

Smith's lips thinned in irritation.

It was apparent Dr. Lance Drew or the attending nurse had mentioned Mark's condition to others on staff. Smith made a mental note to reprimand the Folcroft staff members for their lack of discretion.

"You do not have to stay, Mrs. Mikulka," Smith said.

"Oh," she said, noting his sharp tone. "Yes, sir. I just have to make copies of these and put them downstairs with the rest." She held up a file of papers in her hand.

Smith nodded crisply. He stepped around her, heading for his closed office door.

"It's just awful about Mr. Howard," Mrs. Mikulka said. She was chewing on her thumbnail once more.

"Yes," Smith agreed. "But as I say, I'm sure he'll be fine."

"I hope so," she said absently. "He's such a nice young man. Not that I'm complaining, mind you, Dr. Smith. You know I've always enjoyed working at Folcroft. But things have been so much ...lighter since he came to work here, don't you think? Oh, well. We hope for the best, don't we?"

File in hand and a worried look on her face, she headed for the hall.

"Oh," Mrs. Mikulka called as Smith was reaching for his doorknob. "Your two friends are waiting inside."

She shook her head, muttering to herself. Still clucking concern, she left the outer room.

The care lines of Smith's face faded as he pushed open his office door. It was as if all at once exhaustion and worry had finally taken their toll. His shoulders sank.

Remo and the Master of Sinanju sat on the carpet before Smith's desk. When the CURE director entered his office, both men looked up with troubled eyes.

"How is he?" Remo asked.

Smith's face was blank as he shut the door. He seemed robbed of the ability to display emotion. "Not well," he replied.

Walking numbly past Remo and Chiun, he made a beeline for his desk. He sat down woodenly.

He didn't seem to know what to do with his hands. He nudged his black office phone as if to straighten it. After, he put his hands to the arms of his chair. He didn't turn on his computer. He just stared.

Remo glanced at the Master of Sinanju. There was a hint of sympathy on the old Korean's face. The look of a father who had himself once lost a son.

They all knew what Mark Howard had come to mean to Harold W. Smith. But this was the first time Remo felt it. His own heart went out to Smith, a man unaccustomed to emotion, whose numbness at this point now revealed an unexpected depth of attachment for his young assistant.

"I'm sure he'll be fine, Smitty," Remo said softly.

"Remo is correct, Emperor," Chiun echoed. Slender fingers rested in bony clusters atop carefully scissored knees. "Others have survived this trial in the past. Prince Mark has strength of body, mind and character. He is sure to pass this test."

Smith removed his glasses, placing them on his desk. "While it is true some earlier victims changed back, others could not take the strain, even with the earliest version of the formula," he said wearily. "We know that she has made some alterations. Without an undiluted sample of what she is using now, we can't begin to judge its ultimate effects. At least not until these latest victims begin to change back."

He closed his tired eyes.

"The ones from Manhattan have been transferred to high-security facilities where they will be monitored around the clock," Smith continued. "We will learn from them whether or not humans exposed to this version of the formula are able to slough off the effects."

On the floor, Remo heard the strain in the older man's voice. "I still can't believe she slipped through our fingers like that," he complained. "Now she's at large with that formula again. There's no telling what she'll do next."

Smith opened his eyes. They were rimmed in red. "For America, the greatest risk of White's tampering is not out there. It is downstairs."

The true meaning behind his words was obvious. Remo felt the air of the room still.

"Smitty, you can't be serious," he said quietly. There was not a twitch of emotion on the CURE director's face. He replaced his glasses.

"Given Mark's knowledge of our operations, I obviously cannot allow him to be remanded to the custody of another facility," he said. "Even here at Folcroft he is a potential threat. I have placed him in the secure ward, away from the general population. Still, in his current condition he is the worst kind of threat for us."

There was a time when Remo would have welcomed Smith's words. But that now seemed a long time gone.

"The kid's been locked up downstairs before and you didn't consider pulling the plug on him, Smitty," Remo said.

Smith didn't look at Remo. He spun his chair to the window. His own reflection stared back at him from the dark pane. He was surprised at how old he seemed.

"That's not entirely true, Remo," he replied quietly.

Smith's voice seemed faraway. Given the current circumstances, he seemed almost to be looking back wistfully on the events that had twice before put Mark Howard in CURE's special basement isolation ward.

Despite his fondness for his assistant, CURE security overruled all other considerations. That was true for all of them-Remo, Chiun, even Smith himself. The CURE director was no hypocrite. In the pocket of his vest was a coffin-shaped pill that Smith intended to take on his last day as administrator of America's most secret agency. The pill had been procured for Smith by another CURE agent many years ago. That man had been Smith's only real friend and yet, when CURE security was threatened, Smith had ordered his death. Just as he would order the death of Mark Howard if circumstances deemed it necessary.

Remo and Chiun felt the heavy burden that weighed on the bony shoulders of Harold W. Smith. Again Remo felt a pang of sympathy for this taciturn man whom he did not always like, but whom he always respected.

"Let me know when you need me," Remo said softly.

Smith said nothing. Swiveling back around in his chair, he offered a crisp nod.

"Worry not about the health of your heir, Emperor Smith," Chiun said. "A fire burns in his soul. This have I seen. He will not slip easily into the Void. Concern yourself more with finding the fiend who has done this to him."

"I have been working on that, Master Chiun," Smith said. He seemed relieved to discuss something other than his assistant. "Mark narrowed our search for her lab considerably. I have been attempting to weed through the larger list, reducing it to the likeliest locations. Still, even if we find it, there is no guarantee that she will return there now."

Remo had already spent enough time sitting around Folcroft. He suddenly rose to his feet.

"All right, that's it," he said firmly. "She got away. So what? Everybody's got to be somewhere. I'll just go back to Maine and beat the bushes until I flush her out."

The CURE director shook his head. "We cannot know that she is still there," he said. "She has what she wants. She collected the formula she left behind. It would make sense for her to get out of the area now that she knows we are on to her."

"She doesn't have what she wants, Smitty," Remo said. "I'm fine, remember? She didn't turn me into some sort of Vicious Bearded Gagon in her freak menagerie."

"I still do not think that was her intention," the CURE director said. "But what else it might have been, I have no clue. Her scheme was not merely to infect those who drank her tampered product. If so, she would have used the newer, permanent version of the formula. The kind she used suggests she only wanted a temporary army at her disposal. Still, one has to assume that she ultimately wants to transform all mankind into creatures like herself."

"Patience is not a quality exclusive to humans," Chiun suggested.

"Agreed," Smith said. "So we know her ultimate goal, and we know that she considers whatever it is she is up to to be a step toward achieving that goal. She does not mind the attention this will draw to her as long as she succeeds. I almost wish she simply wanted to make Remo one of her own. It would simplify things for us. Until we do know what she's truly after, we are all at a great disadvantage."

He was interrupted by the buzzing of his phone. It was the interoffice line.

"Excuse me," Smith said, reaching for the receiver.

Remo was still standing. As Smith answered the phone, he turned to the Master of Sinanju.

"I don't like just standing here doing nothing," he complained, clenching and unclenching his hands.

"The creature has fled. Smith's oracles have yet to locate the place where she created her wicked brews. What do you propose we do?"

"I don't know," Remo said, frustrated.

"Then by all means," Chiun said, "go waste effort and time running around doing nothing just to make yourself feel like you are doing something. In the meantime, I will remain here and pray to my ancestors that you are not so exhausted when you finally do meet her that she does not kill you and feast on your impatient innards." He patted the rug beside him. "Or you could sit, my son, and meditate with me."

Reluctantly, Remo realized his teacher was right. He was about to sink back to the floor when he was stopped by a sharp intake of breath across Smith's desk. When he looked over, he saw that the grayness had drained from the CURE director's face, leaving behind a sickly shocked white. The older man's arthritic knuckles bulged in pearl knots around the receiver.

"I will be right there," Smith choked.

He was on his feet even before he had hung up the phone. Seeing his urgency, Chiun rose like gentle steam from the floor.

"What's wrong?" Remo asked. He and Chiun fell in behind Smith as the CURE director raced for the door.

Smith flung the office door open. "There has been an incident downstairs," he blurted. When he cast a glance at Remo, his eyes were sick with fear. "Mark has escaped."

Chapter 32

The room was a shambles. The examining table on which they had put Mark Howard was overturned. The straps that had bound him were snapped.

There was a blood streak on one wall. Mottled brown hair clung to the shiny strip.

From the hall, Smith's troubled eyes were drawn from the blood to the pair of white shoes sticking out from behind the toppled table.

Two nurses in starched white uniforms tended to the injured woman. With them were the two orderlies who had helped bring Mark inside from the helicopter. As Smith hurried into the room, accompanied by Remo and Chiun, a doctor ran past them. He flew over to the group near the table.

Dr. Lance Drew was leaning back against the wall near the door. He pressed a bundle of red-soaked gauze against his neck. Blood stained his fingers. Smith quickly surveyed the scene.

"Master Chiun," he announced tightly, nodding to the injured woman, "could you please see if there is anything you can do?"

As the Master of Sinanju hurried over to the stricken woman, Remo and Smith stepped over to Drew.

"What happened?" Smith demanded.

Dr. Drew seemed dazed. "I don't know," he said, shaking his head. "He just came out of nowhere. The nurse was about to administer the tranquilizer. But before she could, I heard that terrible snapping."

Smith glanced at the broken restraints. One frayed end lay across the ankle of the unconscious nurse. Gray eyes darted to Remo. The younger man's face was dark.

Another nurse came racing into the room. For an instant she hesitated, trying to take everything in. "See to Dr. Drew," Smith snapped.

Nodding, the nurse led the zombielike Dr. Lance Drew out into the antiseptic hallway.

The Master of Sinanju was hurrying back to Remo and Smith, his face stone.

"How is she?" the CURE director asked.

"She will live," the Master of Sinanju said. "It is merely a concussion. Your quacksalvers believe it to be worse."

The group on the floor was lifting the nurse onto a portable stretcher. They carried the woman hurriedly from the examining room. Their frantic voices quickly faded down the long corridor.

"We must find Mark," Smith insisted once they were alone. His face was pleading.

"He doesn't have much of a head start," Remo said. "And we know for sure which direction he'll be heading in. Maybe we can catch up with him before he does anything stupid."

He began to turn, but Smith grabbed his arm. "No," the CURE director said urgently. His mind was reeling. He tried to force his thoughts into focus. "Mark is highly intelligent. Do not assume he is heading north. At least not straight away."

"She's given them all the same call of the wild, Smitty. She had a million of those things somehow find their way up there. His brain is wired on automatic pilot."

"Perhaps," Smith said, worriedly. "But Mark knows we are aware of that aspect of the genetic programming. If it is not an overwhelming urge, perhaps he can fight it. If so, he could go in an altogether other direction at first, just to avoid the inevitable net he knows I will cast."

"There is some intelligence to the brutes," the Master of Sinanju agreed somberly. "If the Regent retains some small aspect of himself, the Emperor could be correct."

"Fine. We won't assume north."

Smith nodded sharply. The three men hurried out into the hallway. "In the meantime, CURE's computer systems are at risk," Smith said. "Mark knows the codes and could access them remotely. I will have to lock them down."

"One of us should remain with you, Emperor, in case the Prince is still in the building," Chiun said.

"No," Smith insisted. "I will be safe. There are two tranquilizer guns stored in the basement. I will get them once I am finished securing the CURE systems."

Smith headed for the stairwell doors while Remo and Chiun continued for the exit.