Warren Murphy: Survival Course

El Padrino stood up. He nodded to Comandante Embutes. He pulled Guadalupe to her feet, checking the cords that bound her hands behind her back.

El Padrino lifted her chin in his many-ringed hands.

"We all wish to survive, eh, chica?"

And Officer Guadalupe Mazatl lowered her head in Aztec shame at his arrogant ladino smile.

Chapter 26

Remo parked at the tourist entrance to the ruined necropolis of Teotihuacan. There was a museum ticket booth nearby. The door stood open. It was deserted.

"Looks like everybody cleared out," Remo said, coming out of the museum. He handed the Master of Sinanju a brochure, saying, "Here's a layout of the place, in case we have to split up."

They walked between two long buildings into the ruins, coming to the base of an immense flat-sided pyramid that reared up for hundreds of feet so steeply its summit could not be seen. It was like a square wedding cake, each section smaller than the one under it. The broad stairs stopped at frequent open terraces. "Remo, such magnificence!" Chiun squeaked suddenly, his tired eyes brightening to birdlike clarity.

"It's the Pyramid of the Sun," Remo replied. "And don't get carried away with past glories. The Aztecs are all gone."

"It looks almost Egyptian. Could these Aztecs have been a colony of Egypt? Only the Pyramid of Cheops rivals this."

Remo frowned. They were standing on a long straight stone-paved road. Grass grew in the chinks between the cobbles. In fact, it grew along the sides of the dull brown pyramid.

"Says here we're standing on the Avenue of the Dead," Remo said, reading from his brochure. He gazed down the road. Past a line of flat structures like flat-topped temples, the road ended at the foot of a smaller pyramid that seemed to have been excavated from a hill. The back of the pyramid was still embedded in the hill.

"And that's the Pyramid of the Moon," Remo added. He looked up. "I didn't expect anything this big. There's an awful lot of ground to cover. What do you think?"

"I think that we missed a wonderful client in the Aztecs," Chiun said wistfully, scanning his brochure.

"Forget that stuff," Remo snapped. "We'd better get organized before Gordons gets here." He looked up. "What about the top of this pyramid?"

The Master of Sinanju shaded his eyes, trying to see the pyramid's top. He could not.

"Yes," he said. "We will go up this one."

They started up the tumbledown steps. The stairs became broader as they ascended, until they reached the middle terrace, where they paused to look around and catch their breath.

"Better watch it, Little Father," Remo warned. "You can't see the steps until you're on top of them. Don't walk off the side."

The Master of Sinanju stepped to the terrace lip and looked down. It was true. The broken stone steps were so steep one had to walk to the very edge before they became visible. He frowned. The mighty Egyptians had never constructed anything so marvelous.

The city of Teotihuacan extended for several square miles in every direction. Despite the danger, Remo was impressed by its sad vastness. " I wonder if America will ever reach this stage?" he wondered aloud.

"Count on it," Chiun said. "Let us continue."

They trudged up to the topmost terrace, their lungs laboring to extract oxygen from the thin, polluted air. Chiun's breath whistled.

Above them, the pyramid's apex was accessible by a narrow flight of steps so steep that it was impossible to see their top. They seemed to merge with the brownish sky.

Remo was looking down toward a distant stone edifice his brochure called the Temple of Quetzalcoad. "I don't see any sign of Tito," he said. "Guess we gotta go to the top."

They started the final ascent. As they mounted the rubble-strewn steps, a towering stone carving became visible. It stood amid the rocks of the pyramid's uneven summit.

Remo looked at it without pleasure. "What the hell is this thing?"

It stood over eight feet in height, and seemed almost four feet wide. It was made of rude stone. It resembled, if anything, an Aztec conception of a robot. The broad head was carved into serpent heads perched nose-to-nose so that its side-mounted orbs looked out with wall-eyed balefulness. It wore a ghoulish double grin. Two other serpent heads formed shoulder epaulets, and instead of hands it sported blunted stone slabs. Its chest was arrayed with human hearts and dismembered hands. A skull served as a kind of belt buckle.

There was barely enough room on the rubble-strewn top for them and the idol when they joined it on the summit.

"It is an ugly Aztec goddess," Chiun said, looking around at the panorama of dead Teotihuacan far below. A river meandered nearby, as brown as an earthworn.

"I think you're right," Remo said, examining the idol. "It's a female. That's a skirt made of snakes. The whole thing is a walking snake pit." He paged through his brochure, trying find the snake goddess's name.

" I do not see any sign of Tito below," Chiun said, looking west.

"Ugly monstrosity, isn't it?" Remo muttered, looking at the idol's clawed feet. "Not exactly Egyptian."

"Its head is two serpents joined at the nose," Chiun noted. "The Egyptian gods had animal heads too. "

"If this is Egyptian, I'm as Aztec as Guadalupe."

"Behold," Chiun said suddenly, pointing to a cleared area of dirt where sat an olive helicopter. Comandante Odio's helicopter. Remo saw that the front seats were mangled and mashed.

Remo looked up. "He's already here," he said grimly. "Damn!"

"Beware, Remo," Chiun intoned. "He was not in the form of Tito when he journeyed here. He was much larger, much heavier. For both seats are crushed. "

"Good. That'll make him easier to spot," Remo said. He turned his attention back to the brochure. "Funny," he muttered. "I can't find it."

"Keep looking," Chiun said, his keen eyes raking the surrounding terrain. "He must be somewhere."

"Not Tito. This stone thing. According to this, we're standing on the rubble of a temple. No mention of any snake goddess," Remo's voice got smaller. "Uh-oh," he muttered, his gaze lifting to the double serpent head. He eyed its blank scaly face for expression.

"Little Father," he said softly.

The Master of Sinanju turned, his eyes quizzical. He saw his pupil's thumb surreptitiously jerking in the direction of the stone snake idol.

Chiun's eyes went very wide. Then, in a high squeaky voice, he said, " I hope our friend Josip Broz Tito arrives very soon."

"Yes indeedy," Remo chimed in brightly, edging away from the massive idol. "Be nice if he's early. The plane is waiting to take us back to the U. S., where we'll all be nice and safe."

"True, true," Chiun rejoined, also stepping away from the idol. "There is no telling what will happen to him if these Mexicans discover he has usurped their precious statue. He will be in very grave danger. They are no doubt pursuing him mightily at this very moment."

"Hope nothing happens," Remo added loudly. "I'd sure like to help him out."

They stopped. The statue simply stood there, immobile, invincible, inert. An Aztec golem.

"Maybe they already got him," Remo ventured pointedly.

"Yes, you are undoubtedly correct, Remo," Chiun said. "Let us go. There is nothing we can do for poor Tito now."

They started down the steps.

The sudden sound was like breaking rocks. It came from the summit. They turned, their hands lifting defensively, ready for anything.

The stone idol called Coatlicue roused to life. The kissing serpents parted and pointed down at them, a doubleheaded monstrosity on weaving stone necks. Its arms lifted to show its maimed forearms. And it spoke in a voice like grinding stones.

"I am here!" he rumbled.

"You are no longer Tito," Chiun remarked calmly.