Warren Murphy: Feeding Frenzy

Remo sank to his knees. His arms went as limp as liver. As if they were only balloons, all the air seemed to leak out of his muscles. Closing his eyes, he bowed his head.

For a moment, he was still. For a moment, his heart stopped. And for a moment, the air in his lungs began to escape with a steady tired hissing. Then, a long silence fell.

Nalini laughed. She climbed off the bed and took his dark hair in her grasping fingers.

"Show me your dying eyes," she sneered, jerking his head backward on its unresisting neck. "So I will know that my ancestors have been avenged."

Remo's eyes snapped open. The whites were bright blue. But deep in the black core of his pupils a red spark flickered angrily.

And out of his mouth, mixed with a hot black spray of expelled venom, came a hollow roar of a voice.

"I am created Shiva, the Destroyer; Death, the shatterer of worlds!"

With a startled shriek, Nalini Toshi recoiled.

"What is this! What is this!" she said, shrinking against a wall.

And as she watched, the figure on its knees began jerking as if reviving electricity were jumping through every lean muscle and sinew.

"What are you doing?" Nalini moaned. "You should not die like that!"

And the figure came to its feet, tall, unbowed, erect in every way. The eyes were red coals and the surrounding whites where white again.

The mouth dropped open. "Who is this dog meat who stands before me?"

Nalini pressed her back to the wall in fear. "I-I am the last living Spider Diva, Nalini."

"No," said the voice of Shiva the Destroyer. "You are the dead Spider Diva, Nalini."

Nalini Toshi watched the hand lift to her eyeline as if it were in slow motion. She realized the hand was not moving in slow motion. These were the last moments of her life and her senses were doing this-trying to hold on to every precious moment the turning wheel of destiny had allotted her.

She saw the hand, like a weaving cobra's head, form a wedge and aim blunt fingers toward her face. The cruel face behind the hand went out of focus as her eyes were mesmerized by the fingertips she knew had the power to obliterate her, just as other empty hands had obliterated those of her kind who came before.

"I consign you to a place of no returning," said the hollow voice.

And the hand struck.

There was nothing more after that. No thought. No fear. There was not enough time for her brain to call up in kaleidoscope all the images it had recorded in life.

Nalini Toshi collapsed, her face an inverted mask of crushed bone and raw meat, onto the broken bodies of her children.

And in Remo's dark eyes, a red spark flared, then dwindled. He shook his head as if to clear it of cobwebs.

Chapter 29

Remo was putting his pants on when the Master of Sinanju burst into the room. Chiun froze.

"What has happened here?" he demanded, his cold eyes switching between the calm figure of his pupil and the sprawled inert thing that was the last of the Spider Divas.

"Figure it out," said Remo, his voice stripped of all emotion.

"I see the Spider Diva, dead."

"That's all you need to know."

Chiun hovered over the dead woman, taking in her nakedness. "You could not resist her, could you?"

"That's between her and me," said Remo, avoiding his Master's searching eyes.

Chiun cocked his head to one side. "But you paid a price."

"How do you know?"

"I heard the mantra of Shiva."

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Remo, buckling his belt.

"We will speak of it later. I have found Thrush Limburger, a prisoner in the basement. He has told me all he knows."

"Clancy's behind this," said Remo.

"She told you that?"

"Yeah. "

"And you believed her-a Hindu and a harlot?"

"Who else could it be?" said Remo, his voice returning to its normal timbre. "Come on, let's get out of here."

They stepped out into the corridor and a blue disk of a thing came wheeling toward them.

"What is that, Remo?" Chiun asked.

"A security robot. No big deal."

An orange light winked on and Remo stepped forward. His foot came up and down, and the robot broke like a china plate.

"See?" he said. "No big deal. They just came on the market. This is one of the cheaper models. All they do is beep out a warning."

"Ah. "

"So where's Limburger?" Remo asked.

"I left him sleeping below."

"It might help if Smith sent in the cavalry and they found Limburger here."

"That is for Smith to decide."

Remo peered about, his thick wrists rotating absently. "So what is the best way out of here?"

"Have you forgotten something, Remo?"

Remo frowned. "What?"

"You left an old woman helpless."

"Oh, yeah. Pearl Clancy. That won't take a minute."

The Master of Sinanju followed his pupil to the great parlor in the center of the rambling house.

"The whole thing was a scheme to get Ned Clancy into the White House next time around," Remo was saying. "Nalini was the Eldress. She set up all the dominoes at the start, and once HELP was a big deal, started knocking them down so Clancy could rehabilitate himself politically."

"You walk unsteadily," Chiun pointed out.

"I caught a dose."

"It does not appear to trouble you very much."

They came to the door.

"Did I mention I saw the same thing that Sambari saw in the forest?" said Remo.

"And?"

Remo threw open the door. "Sambari was a fraidy cat."

Thinning his dry lips, the Master of Sinanju followed his insolent pupil into the room.

Pearl Clancy crouched in her wheelchair like a mummy refusing to die. Her head jerked around, and her eyes widened. She began bouncing in place.

"This poor woman has been through much," Chiun said.

"She could've done a better job of raising her kids," Remo said, kneeling down to reconnect the battery cables.

The wheelchair motor whined back into life and Pearl Clancy grabbed for the control stick. Since it wasn't there anymore, she made a fist and beat the armrest futilely.

Chiun regarded her with compassion.

"She is a pitiful sight. There is almost nothing left of her but her mind."

"If that," Remo grunted, restoring the silver pen to the universal socket on the wheelchair armrest. "Let's go, Little Father."

And as they started from the room, Pearl Clancy grasped the pen and pushed it forward. The wheelchair whined after them, and Pearl Clancy tried to run them down.

They walked faster.

Then Pearl Clancy bugged out her eyes, bringing her outstretched forefingers to her slack mouth. They began wriggling up and down, in and out.

"She is still following us," Chiun told Remo.

"Big deal."

And from the gray disorder of Pearl Clancy's hair emerged red matchstick heads that split to reveal curving black fangs.

Walking along, Remo felt something in his hair, and brushed it off. He stomped the scuttling red thing into the floor.

"Musta missed one," he muttered.

"You smell of that harlot again," Chiun sniffed.

Then one landed on the bald top of his head.

The Master of Sinanju hissed, "What is this?" and shook his head once sharply.

A jumping spider landed in a corner and skittered out again. It lifted itself up on its rear set of legs and wriggled its fangs in their direction.

And behind them, Pearl Clancy wriggled her forefingers back.

As they watched, the jumping spider crouched and launched itself at her head. It crawled into her hair as two more heads poked out, separating.

"Chiun, do you see what I see?" Remo said.

"She is a Spider Diva too!" Chiun cried.

And Pearl Clancy leered at them, drool leaking from her slack mouth.

Two spiders jumped, one for Remo and one for Chiun.

They fended them off with quick blows, bringing their heels down on the dying things as soon as they hit the floor.