Warren Murphy: Unnatural Selection

"Al-Khobar?" Remo asked.

"No, not terrorists. At least I do not think so. The first was at some kind of publishing house. I might have ignored it if the computers hadn't found five more incidents since then. The people involved have been reduced to some sort of feral state, snarling and biting like animals."

"Sounds like New Yorkers fighting over a cab."

"This goes well beyond the norm, Remo. I suspect there might be some new form of drug at the center. People are being mauled. Some reports even suggest there is cannibalism involved, although that obviously seems ludicrous."

"Cannibalism? Smitty, you've got to stop getting your intelligence reports from the Weekly World News."

"As I've suggested, things are still sketchy at the moment. But- Oh my." Smith paused. "There is a report here of a senior credit analyst at a bank suddenly going berserk and tearing out his supervisor's throat. Please check this out, Remo. I'll arrange a flight. Call me for the information when you reach the airport."

"Can do, Smitty."

He hung up the phone.

"Smitty wants us back home, so we're going to have to eat breakfast fast," he called to the Master of Sinanju's closed bedroom door. "You want trout?"

"Carp," the old Korean's voice replied.

"I'm still getting trout," Remo warned. "Don't go getting all pissy saying you wanted trout, too, when it comes."

"Carp," Chiun said. "And I'm not talking to you."

"I should be so lucky," Remo grumbled as he reached for the phone.

Chapter 5

The plump, middle-aged woman on the flight from Little Rock thought that it was ghastly, just ghastly, that the old Asian gentleman's son had forced his elderly father to travel to New York in his pajamas. When Chiun explained that the black robes were mourning garments, she grew puzzled. The sad little man had insisted his garments were his murderous son's doing. She asked who died.

"My dreams. My hopes. My eternal, burning desire that a son to whom I have given the world would show me a mere ounce of gratitude for all he has had bestowed upon him."

"Knock it off, Chiun. Those robes are celebration. White is mourning."

The moon-faced woman turned her quivering jowls toward Remo. Green eyeshade rose haughtily on her broad forehead.

"You, sir, are a monster."

"Said Swamp Thing's grandmother," Remo said as he looked out the plane's window. He usually found the clouds pretty. They didn't seem very pretty today.

The woman's face became a mask of jiggling horror.

"You're right," she said to Chiun. "He's a brute. I'm going to report him the instant we land."

"Others have tried," Chiun said pitifully. "But he is as wily as he is cruel. He has escaped punishment for the many crimes he has committed against me and others. Even now he travels in luxury at the expense of your government."

"I know a thing or two about government," the woman insisted. "My cousin is a United States senator." She unclamped her handbag and rummaged inside, producing a small pad and a gold pen. "Give me your name," she demanded of Remo.

"Alfonse D'Amato. I'll let you figure out where you can shove the apostrophe."

The appalled woman immediately summoned a flight attendant, who in turn called the pilot.

The pilot was a pleasant-faced man in his late forties. He was muscular with a shock of black hair that was turning gray at the temples. In his shirtsleeves, shoulders marked with civilian captain's insignia, he picked his way through the cabin to the source of the commotion.

"Is there a problem?" he asked the woman who sat clucking like an angry hen between Remo and Chiun.

"I want police on the ground when we land," the woman insisted. She aimed a sausage-thick finger at Remo. "This man is guilty of elder abuse. I want him arrested and thrown in jail for what he has done to this poor, sweet man."

The pilot glanced from Remo to Chiun. "Sir, is this man mistreating you?" he asked the Master of Sinanju.

"He is wicked in both thought and deed," Chiun responded fearfully. "Just recently he locked me in a cell while he went off gallivanting for days on end."

"I was only gone a couple hours," Remo said.

"He shouldn't be left alone for one minute at his age," the matronly woman snapped.

"He locked you in a cell?" the pilot demanded.

"That cell had cable TV and a door that locked from the inside. He could have escaped a hundred times."

"My hands were too feeble to work the door handles," Chiun said weakly. "He even forced me to eat carp when I wanted trout."

"You poor, poor dear," the woman said. She patted Chiun's hand. The Master of Sinanju nodded morose appreciation at the small kindness.

"Quit it, will you, Chiun?" Remo snapped.

"Leave him alone, you tyrant," the woman barked.

"I've seen enough," the pilot said. "The authorities are going to want to question you when we land, sir."

"Oh, come on," Remo said. "I didn't do anything."

"Then you have nothing to worry about."

"Look what you did," Remo groused at Chiun.

"Can't you lock him away somewhere for the rest of the flight?" the plump woman whispered loudly to the pilot. "He seems unbalanced."

"I'll give you unbalanced, Aunt Bee," Remo snapped.

Quick as a flash, two hard fingers shot into the woman's doughy wattle, pressing into her throat. False eyelashes flickered, and the woman suddenly could not refuse the urge to sleep. Her head slumped forward.

"Peace and quiet. All I ever want," Remo complained.

As the woman began snoring, the pilot tried to flee. Remo grabbed him by his dangling tie and reeled him in.

"They need you to land this thing?" The pilot shook his head.

"In that case, nighty-night."

Remo sent the pilot to slumberland. He dumped the pilot's face in the lap of the sleeping woman, then called over a flight attendant.

"Oh, my God!" the woman exclaimed. "What happened?"

"Beats me," Remo said.

"He did it," Chiun said.

"Put a sock in it, will you?" Remo said. "When's the in-flight movie start?" he asked the stewardess. The bodies were quickly cleared away. While the cleanup was going on, there was a lot of whispering Remo didn't like the sound of.

When the plane reached La Guardia twenty minutes later and was immediately cleared for landing, Remo knew he was in trouble. There were police on the ground. Remo saw them out the window.

"This is all your fault," he groused, unbuckling his seat belt.

"Of course," Chiun said. "Blame the innocent, defend the guilty. The very underpinnings of white culture."

"Shake a leg, Johnnie Cochran," Remo insisted. He hurried up the aisle. The Master of Sinanju followed.

They found the flight crew hiding out in the galley. The crew was dismayed at Remo's appearance through the curtain.

"Please return to your seats," a flight attendant commanded.

"Believe me, I'd like to. No rest for the weary." Remo stuffed the man in the rest room. When others protested, he stuffed them in, too.

"You missed one," Chiun pointed out blandly as the navigator tried to flee.

"Thanks a heap," Remo said, collaring the man. There was no room left in the bathroom. He jammed the man in a cupboard.

By the time the plane rolled to a stop, Remo had locked away pretty much everyone but the copilot. "Great thinking for you to start this stuff up again now," Remo complained as he shoved a few loose arms and legs into a particularly cramped closet. "Calling attention to us on a plane flying in to New York. Smitty's gonna love this."

"I did nothing but make a friend," Chiun sniffed. "You introduced violence. That is your way. Violent and hostile. You should enroll in one of those classes that teaches people like you how to manage your anger."

"Take my word for it, I'm managing it."

All potential witnesses were now safely locked away. The passengers were still oblivious.