Warren Murphy: Misfortune Teller

"This is all irrelevant," Smith complained.

"Where?"

Smith sighed. "Of course he may have logged a false flight plan, but New York seems to be his ultimate destination."

"Great. Get me on a plane to New York."

"Not now," Smith said. "There are still matters to be resolved in the Koreas."

"There aren't any matters left. They're all resolved."

Smith did not sound convinced. "Are you certain?"

"What, are you kidding me?" Remo scoffed, as if insulted. "Didn't you know I can see the future?"

Chapter 32

Sun arrived back at his East Hampton estate, jetlagged yet triumphant.

The great force of the Pythia had remained quiescent since he had left North Korea. The spirit had been greatly weakened from its mighty battle a year before. The action of the past few days had not helped. Sun needed exposure to the urn in order to recharge the batteries of the possessing force within him.

His limo driver dropped him at the end of the main driveway near the front door. Roseflower greeted him as he stepped inside the large foyer.

"I heard the bad news, Reverend," his Sunnie assistant said somberly.

"Bad? Are you crazed?" Sun asked, grinning. "Things could not have gone better. Both Kim Jong Il and Kim Dae Jung are dead. My country cries out for a ruler. Pack my belongings. We shall all return to a united Korea this day where I will be crowned king."

"But..." Roseflower seemed perplexed. He held in his hand the latest edition of Sun's own newspaper. The Sunnie glanced from the headline to his leader, obviously uncertain as to whether or not he should continue.

Sun snatched the paper from his hand.

U.S./South Korea To North: "Bombs. Away!"

The Sunnie leader was instantly confused. He perused the text quickly, his face growing more ashen with each line he read. He had gotten no more than a few paragraphs into the story before flinging the paper at his subordinate. As the different sections tumbled in huge sheets to the floor, Man Hyung Sun was already running up the stairs to his bedroom.

THE AIRPORT TAXI DROPPED Remo and Chiun off outside the high walls of Sun's East Hampton, Long Island, estate.

"Are you all right with this?" Remo asked once the cab had disappeared down the street.

"There is nothing with which to be all right," Chiun sniffed. "You have posed an interesting theory. However, I reserve judgment until we speak with Sun."

Remo noted that the Master of Sinanju no longer referred to the cult leader as Great Seer or by any other title. He didn't mention the lack of honorifics.

They took to the wall, scampering quickly up and over like a pair of spider monkeys. They were greeted on the other side by an eruption of gunfire.

"Doesn't look like they're too happy to see us, Little Father," Remo said as he danced around a hail of bullets. Sudden pockmarks spit powder from the wall behind him.

Armed Sunnies were fanned out across the lawn. They were lying in their pink robes on a thin coat of freshly fallen snow. The only thing that might have made them more obvious would have been if their bald heads lit up in neon.

Chiun did not respond to Remo's comment. No sooner had the gunfire begun than the Master of Sinanju was off. He swirled into the midst of their attackers, his toes seeking out bald domes. Wherever they landed, there was a hollow thwak as of somebody puncturing a soccer ball. After each thwak, another gun would fall silent.

"Aiiee!" screamed the Master of Sinanju as he tore through the Sunnie army.

"If they didn't know we were coming, they do now," Remo commented to the holes in the wall.

He ran after Chiun.

THE SCREAM FROM OUTSIDE chilled Man Hyung Sun to his very marrow. It was the Master of Sinanju. He lived. And he was coming for Sun.

The cult leader was in his bedroom closet. The humidifiers were on, and he had a blanket thrown over both his head and the ancient Greek urn. But although he pulled deeply at the thin yellow smoke that rose line mist from the damp powder, no visions came.

The Pythia was weaker than ever. The fractured essence of Apollo was all but gone. It had not been merely dormant on the flight back to America. It was almost dead.

The gunfire stopped abruptly.

Sun gulped at the yellow smoke. fear gripping his chest.

The Pythia was almost dead. As was he.

PINK-SWATHED BODIES lay strewed across the lawn. Some of the Sunnies fled when they realized the pointlessness of their efforts. Remo and Chiun let them go. Their prize was in the main house.

They crossed a snow-covered terrace and kicked in a set of French door-, that opened into the grand ballroom. The psychic-hotline switchboards that had been there two days before were gone. Remo didn't know if they had shut down the tele-scam operation or simply moved to another location. Nor did he care.

The two Masters of Sinanju breezed into the ballroom, crossing the highly polished floor to the large curtained doorway that led into the main foyer. They were nearly at the door when Roseflower jumped out before them, brandishing a submachine gun.

"You'll get to Reverend Sun over my dead body!" the beefy Loonie announced boldly.

"I'll take that as an invitation," Remo said.

Leaping forward, he grabbed Roseflower by the throat, squeezing so tightly that neck and spine were crushed like an aluminum beer can. Both gun and Sunnie fell in a heap to the floor.

Remo and Chiun continued on to the staircase.

THE PLAIN WAS FADING at its most distant points. It was as if the area where the Pythia sat were an island surrounded by a sea of nothingness. Even the sky was gone. There was a great looming emptiness hovering just above his head.

The Pythia was still there. Weak. Racked with pain. It looked up at Sun with what had been its piercing yellow eyes. They were now dull, fading even as Sun watched.

"You failed," the Pythia said.

"The missiles were intercepted," Sun replied. He panted in this otherworldly place, just as his physical self was panting in the corporeal world.

"I did not foresee that," the Pythia admitted ruefully.

Sun was aghast. "You're a clairvoyant! The Oracle of Delphi! The most famous fortune-teller in the history of mankind! What do you mean you did not foresee that?"

The Pythia looked up. "I see much. Not all. What I gave you was a future. Not the future. I do much better with more immediate events. Like now." The floating smile above the cloud of yellow mist was deeply unsettling. "I see your future."

Eyes grew wide. "Yes?" Sun hissed. "What is it?"

The lopsided smile seemed indecisive. As if the Pythia was not sure whether to laugh or cry.

"Short," the spirit said.

There was an explosion of sound like snapping kindling from somewhere close by.

The vision receded in a flash of yellow. Sun was on his stool in his bedroom closet. He pulled the towel from his head, spying the remnants of his locked door lying in shards all around the floor. With horror, he saw Remo and Chiun standing in the open doorway.

"There's a familiar stink," Remo commented as he sniffed the fetid closet air. He nodded to the urn at Sun's feet from which the sickly sulfur smell was emanating.

Chiun's eyes condensed into slivers of pure rage. Hands clenched in thorns of vicious ivory at his sides, he began walking deliberately toward the seated cult leader.

As he looked at the two men who would deal him death, the yellow fire danced in the eyes of Man Hyung Sun.

"It was not me," Sun begged. "It was the minion of Apollo. He drove me to do these things."

Remo leaned against the door frame. "Possession is nine-tenths of the law," he said with a shrug.

Sun fell over backward off his stool. He struggled to his feet, falling against the far wall of the big closet. Hangers rattled against one another as he flattened his arms against the walls in terror.