Warren Murphy - The Final Reel

This encouraged the Arabs to work faster.

In the end there were three more Americans dead. Including the secretary of state. Helena Eckert's sun-ravaged body was placed carefully at the sandaled feet of the Master of Sinanju.

"See to the injuries of those left alive," Chiun instructed, his voice so cold it seemed to chill the very desert air. "If one more dies, you will suffer a fate so great the lives of these will seem joyful." He indicated the unconscious American delegation.

There were a few military trucks left around the site. The Americans were carefully loaded inside. Per Chiun's order, the wasted body of the sultan of Ebla was loaded less delicately in the first truck. He continued to slumber in sick oblivion. The bodies of the four dead Americans were placed in with him.

Chiun singled out an Ebla Arab Army soldier. "You." Chiun pointed. "Eblan. Nakh that camel for the Master of Sinanju."

The man did as he was told. There was a makeshift corral of the animals away from the tents. He collected the camel Chiun had indicated and brought it to the front of the line of military trucks. Through forceful prodding he got the creature to kneel in the dust.

Chiun climbed atop the thickly furred hump. As if recognizing some unspoken sign, the animal rose back to its wide feet. The old Korean guided the creature's flaring nose north toward Akkadad.

"Follow or die," Chiun called back across the line of trucks.

The Eblan soldiers didn't need to be told a second time. As the vultures returned to pick the carcasses of the soldiers Chiun had slain, the caravan began to make its deliberate way out of the narrow Anatolia Corridor.

Chapter 35

Eblan soldiers swarmed around Taurus Studios, Burbank. There were so many of them jammed onto the many outdoor lots that they were running into one another as they raced to carry wires and boxes from container trucks to buildings.

Tanks had been set up beyond the tall white walls of the studio, establishing a perimeter. Troops had been withdrawn from the other areas the Eblan forces had controlled. They patrolled on foot and on camelback beyond the line of tanks.

This was the fortress from which the last, valiant battle would be fought.

Assola al Khobar screamed orders through a megaphone as he was driven around the studio complex. Men carrying explosives scattered from before the speeding jeep.

The Saudi terrorist had not had time to have the gashes in his lip sewn shut. He had covered the area with thickly folded gauze from the studio infirmary. Tightly pulled masking tape held the gauze in place. Blood-soaked cotton was jammed inside his mouth near the gum line.

The words he shouted as he was driven around the area were loud and nearly indecipherable. And panicked.

Since his base of operations had been at Taurus, al Khobar had been loath to hook up the explosives there. He had planned to do that after everything was set up elsewhere. Prior to the invasion of Israel.

But the precious timetable he had meticulously established had been completely disrupted by his abduction. The Americans wouldn't hold out much longer. Now that the battle had been joined in Israel, the invasion would come here at any moment.

He would have been ready. He should have been ready.

"Faster, faster, faster!" Assola shouted. The word became unintelligible as he sprayed blood-filled saliva onto the megaphone.

The men were already running. They tried hurrying faster as they hooked up the last of the explosives.

"Take me back to the offices," he ordered his driver.

They sped back across the lot to the office complex. Assola was surprised to find another car parked out front.

He climbed out of the jeep and hurried upstairs. The surprise he'd felt downstairs turned to amazement when he entered the office of the studio cochairmen.

Hank Bindle sat calmly behind his desk. The broken window had been replaced. He looked up from a script as al Khobar entered the office.

"Oh, Mr. Koala. I'm glad you're here. We've got to talk about this project of ours."

The terrorist merely stared at the executive. He let the door swing silently shut behind him.

"This isn't working out at all," Bindle said. "The production is falling apart. Now, I know you had your heart set on directing to begin with, and maybe I overstepped my bounds by taking over, but what's done is done. I think we should both know that it's time to call it quits." Bindle sniffled once softly. His eyes grew moist. "My beloved friend and partner, Bruce Marmelstein, suffered a heart attack because of all this. Stress, you know."

He paused, waiting for al Khobar to express the expected degree of sympathy.

When the Arab spoke, his voice was nearly a whisper. "What kind of fool are you, that you would dare show your face here?" al Khobar hissed through a mouth of gauze and cotton. His face was both angry and astonished. His words whistled through the new gaps in his teeth.

Bindle rolled his eyes. "Duh-uh. I'm cochairman of Taurus," he explained.

"You tried to have me killed." The terrorist took a step toward the producer. "You had me tortured." Another step. "You forced me to sign your foolish scraps of paper."

Hank Bindle sat up straighter in his chair. He gulped. "You know about that?" he asked sheepishly.

Al Khobar had had enough. Reaching inside his robes, he pulled loose a heavy automatic. Without preamble he raised the weapon and fired.

The explosion was like a sharp slap against the new plaster walls of the office. The bullet slammed Hank Bindle in the shoulder, toppling him backward from his new chair.

Al Khobar bounded around the desk. He found the executive lying half-propped against the wall beneath the window. His hand clutched the pulsing wound above his chest. Blood seeped from between his fingertips.

Assola pressed his face in close to Bindle's. The smell of blood mixed with that of bad breath and rotting teeth. He grabbed the executive by the front of his shirt, pulling him away from the wall.

"I am going to kill you," the terrorist breathed. His face was that of a twisted ghoul. "You are going to die along with every other piece of American filth in this wretched city. And when I read accounts of this in years to come, I am going to think of your pitiful face and laugh."

He slammed Bindle back against the wall. Leaving the Taurus cochairman where he lay, Assola al Khobar hurried into the office bathroom.

Bindle couldn't move. The pain in his shoulder was far too great. And his fear paralyzed him. He heard water running for several long minutes. After that he heard the sound of plastic rattling. It was not long after that he heard the sound of soft footfalls on the office carpet. Behind the desk he couldn't see a thing.

Bindle felt the change in air pressure as the door opened and then closed once more. Mr. Koala had left.

And left him to die.

Chapter 36

Harold Smith sat anxiously reading reports from out of both Israel and California.

There had been some progress in the Middle East. The Ebla Arab Army had been routed by the superior Israel Defense Forces. Three thousand Eblan soldiers had been killed in the Golan Heights battle. So far only three Israeli soldiers were reported as casualties.

Israel was rounding up another thirteen thousand Eblans into detainment camps. They would likely be returned to their native land after being cleaned and fed. A courtesy that doubtless would not have been extended to the enemy had the battle gone the other way.

Although this could all be taken as good news, Smith did not yet see Chiun's hand in any of the events taking place there. What's more, the war Ebla had started had ignited spot fires around other fundamentalist nations in the Mideast. Radical Muslims in half a dozen countries were gearing up for a major confrontation with Israel.