Warren Murphy: Survival Course

"We will kill this one, hokay?"

Guadalupe looked up through the disarrayed hair over her face. Her brown eyes leaked tears.

"Oh, Coatlicue," she pleaded. "Do not let them kill your daughter. I implore you."

"Do it!" El Padrino ordered.

"No," said the Master of Sinanju. "There is a better way."

"What way is that?" asked Mr. Gordons.

"Ask the woman," Chiun said. "She is about to die. She knows us all. Ask her whom you may trust."

The serpent heads swept away from the Master of Sinanju to the woman, Guadalupe Mazatl.

"Tell me," Gordons rumbled.

"There is only one way you can know the truth," Guadalupe Mazatl said. "And that is by telling them all where the presidente is. Among my people, we have a saying. Caras vemos, corazones no sabemos. It means 'Faces we see, hearts we don't know.'"

"Should I tear out their hearts?" Mr. Gordons asked.

"No. It means that only by their actions can you judge them."

"The woman speaks wisdom," Chiun told Gordons.

The statue was silent. Its unwinking serpent eyes shifted from face to face. Then the heads rejoined with a clicking kiss so that the flat eyes looked out.

"The President is safe within the hollow ape atop the building called Banana," he said at last.

"Banana?" Remo said. Chiun shrugged.

"Banana?" El Padrino asked. Comandante Embutes snapped his fingers. "The monkey atop the Banana boutique. In the Zona Rosa. He is there!"

"Gracias," El Padrino said, signaling to Comandante Embutes, who still had Guadalupe by the hair. He shot her through the temples once. Once was enough.

She slumped over, tumbling back down the steep steps like a broken doll.

"No!" Remo cried. He reached the steps in a single leap. One hand lashed out, ruining the comandante's face. He kicked backward, taking out another pistolero with a toe to the throat.

El Padrino retreated as his men closed on Remo. Their pistols came up, fixing Remo in a crossfire. Remo ducked under a snapping bullet. He felt it go through his hair. He had been too slow, and the other muzzles were tracking for him.

Above, the Master of Sinanju turned to Mr. Gordons.

"You see your answer," he said. "Are we on the same side?"

"Yes."

"Then prove your loyalty by helping my son."

Mr. Gordons serpent head snapped apart. He crushed down the stairs-heavy, ponderous, unstoppable.

As his golem shadow fell over the combatants, El Padrino turned. His face registered horror. He lifted his Uzi. Streams of bullets rattled out, pocking the stone hearts of Coatlicue's broad chest.

Still the monster came on.

Square pile-driver arms swept down, bursting human heads like melons.

Seeing pistoleros falling all around him, Remo Williams slid out of the melee. He took the opportunity to trip one pistolero, sending him over the side of the terrace. The gunman landed on the one below, every bone shattered.

El Padrino ran out of bullets. He made the sign of the cross and stumbled back for the steps. Remo plunged after him.

Mr. Gordons trampled one last pistolero who had stayed to fight, and began lumbering down the stairs.

El Padrino got as far as the next terrace. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Remo and, more frighteningly, Coatlicue descending, and ran for the stairs.

He made a mistake many tourists make. He ran for the stone markers he thought headed the next flight of steps.

El Padrino assumed his feet would hit the stairs running. It was a wrong assumption. There were no stairs. He ran off the side of the pyramid, falling fifty feet. He didn't scream until he hit the terrace. Then he bleated like a lamb tangled in barbed wire.

Remo skidded to a stop. He saw El Padrino lying there, his legs twisted at impossible angles. The drug king coughed blood, proving that he was still alive.

The Master of Sinanju floated to Remo's side, ahead of the descending Coatlicue.

"Now what?" Remo asked, watching Gordons clumsily negotiate the steps.

"See to Guadalupe," Chiun said. "Now!"

"What about Gordons?"

"Leave him to me," the Master of Sinanju said, turning to face Mr. Gordons.

Remo went, quickly disappearing from sight.

Mr. Gordons strode to the lip of the terrace. He looked over the edge to El Padrino's struggling body. He was attempting to crawl to the steps. He left a trail of blood like a snail track.

"Well done, man-machine," said the Master of Sinanju, bowing.

"I am ready to return to America," said Mr. Cordons, clicking his serpent heads together. His walleyed gaze turned to regard the Master of Sinanju.

"You trust me, then?"

"Yes. Because of your actions. They tell me what your face and heart do not. At last I understand meat-machine behavior."

"Very wise. And I trust you too-unless of course you were lying."

"I was not lying. The President is hidden inside the ape."

"Excellent," Chiun said, pleased. His hands withdrew into his kimono sleeves. "Then we shall go to him as allies. After you have answered a question."

"What question?" "When we last encountered one another," Chiun said, "my son Remo fought the thing he thought was you. And I attacked the globe which I believed contained your brain. Both died at the same instant. Which truly contained your brain?"

"It was in the satellite," replied Mr. Gordons.

"That was very clever. And creative."

Mr. Gordons inclined his broad head. "Thank you. I pride myself on my creativity."

"No doubt your brain is an equally creative place this time," said Chiun slyly.

"It is."

"My son, who guessed wrong once before, is convinced it is in your right serpent's head."

"He is wrong," said Mr. Gordons.

"But I am cleverer than he," Chiun went on, lifting a long-nailed finger. "I know that it is in your left head."

"Why do you think that?" asked Mr. Gordons.

"Because you are clever, and that is not only the most creative place for your precious brain but also the safest."

"It is?" asked Mr. Gordons.

"Yes," said the Master of Sinanju. "For most humans are what is called right-brained. Or logical. By making yourself left-brained, you are automatically more creative."

"One moment." Mr. Gordons stepped around in place. His thick legs required him to take small side steps to turn his ponderous stone body.

"Why do you turn your back on me?" Chiun asked politely.

"There is something I must do," Gordons said, bending at the waist. One hand lifted to his left hemisphere.

" I am glad you trust me enough to do this," Chiun said.

"I trust you because of your actions. They tell me you have negotiated in good faith ."

"And your words tell me that you are a blockhead," said the Master of Sinanju as he set one sandaled foot to the serpent-twisted backside of the living statue of Coatlicue and exerted sudden force.

Mr. Gordons, in the act of transferring his brain from his left arm to his left hemisphere, toppled over the pyramid's side without a sound.

Landing, he broke into eight irregular pieces, pulverizing the still-squirming body of Jorge Chingar, a.k.a. El Padrino.

Remo came up the stairs like a rocket. He reached the shattered hulk that was Gordons. He looked up. "He's not moving."

"His left serpent's head is cracked in two," Chiun said as he floated down to join Remo.

"Yeah?" Remo said blankly.

"That's where his brain is," Chiun said smugly.

Remo looked at Coatlicue's fractured face. "How do you know that?" he wondered.

Chiun beamed like a wrinkled yellow angel. "The same way I know that it was I who killed Gordons last time, not you."

"How's that?" Remo said suspiciously.

"Because Gordon's told me so." And Chiun's angelic smile broadened.

"I don't believe it," Remo said as he knelt to examine the inert shattered hulk. Chiun kicked at it as if testing the tires on a used station wagon. Nothing happened. They separated the pieces, expecting a reaction. The statue of Coatlicue still didn't stir.