Warren Murphy - Last Rites

"You couldn't anyway."

"It has never before happened that a pupil declined so sublime an honor, but if you insist upon being an ungrateful white, I will accept the shame and emptiness that follows."

"What's the catch?"

"There is none," Chiun said stiffly. "If at the end of the rite you prefer to go your own way and abandon the Master who lifted you up from whiteness and go off with the ingrate who abandoned you at birth, I will accept your selfish and inconsiderate decision."

"Done," said Remo.

"Then it is done," Chiun said, thin voiced.

"All right," Remo said grudgingly. "What's next?"

"You must capture the Girdle of the Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons."

"They don't have amazons anymore."

"We will consult the Oracle at Delphi for the location of the last surviving amazon, then."

"Greece is out. I'm not going back to Greece."

"Then we will consult Emperor Smith and his wise oracles."

HAROLD W SMITH was surfing the Internet when the call came in on the blue contact telephone.

"Smitty, Remo. Need your help."

"What is it?"

"Find us an amazon."

"What do you mean, an amazon?"

"Chiun caught up with me. Thanks to you. Says I gotta capture the girdle of the amazon queen. He says he'll accept any substitute your computers come up with."

Smith frowned with his entire body. "One moment, please."

Keying in the word amazon, Smith tapped the Search key on his keyboard. The search executed in a twinkling, and Smith read the words: Prime Time's Reigning Amazon: The Inside Story.

"I do have a reasonable facsimile," he reported.

"Good."

"But I imagine you'd prefer a second choice," Smith continued.

"No time. I have things to do and I'm in a hurry to get my labors behind me."

"Very well."

"One second, Smitty. Chiun wants to know where you got this name."

"I am currently logged on to Delphi." Remo's voice got strange. "Delphi?"

"Yes. It is an information service."

Remo grunted and said, "I'm handing the phone over to Chiun. He doesn't want me to know the amazon's name until it's time to grab her girdle."

And when the Master of Sinanju came on the line, Harold Smith whispered the name. Chiun said, "It is an excellent choice. Your oracles are exceedingly farseeing."

"It was entirely random."

"It is wonderfully random," proclaimed the Master of Sinanju, hanging up.

And with that, Harold Smith returned to trolling the net. There was no point in trying to intercede. Remo and Chiun would work things out between them. They always had. Why should this time be any different?

Chapter 21

Roxanne Roeg-Elephante was suffering. Oh, how she suffered. All her life, she had suffered.

She suffered through a childhood filled with unspeakable abuse, which, once her ratings began to sag, she told America about on talk shows ranging from "Copra Inisfree" to "Vicki Loch."

She suffered the affliction of multiple personalities, which America first heard about on "Nancy Jessica Rapunzel."

She endured a double life as a stand-up comedienne and back seat hooker, which a shocked world first learned about on "Rotunda."

She accused her own sister of attempting to lure her into a satanic cult on "Bil Tuckahoe."

Every time she went on TV to reveal another slice of her sordid and painful past, ratings on her hit TV sitcom "Roxanne" shot up. And America reembraced her.

What no one seemed to notice was that she only went on talk shows to reveal these intimate details during May and November. Both sweeps months.

But now Roxanne Roeg-Elephante was really, truly, pitifully suffering.

"Ooww!" she moaned, bellowing like a wounded cow as the six-inch needle penetrated her broad, naked backside. "That friggin' hurts."

"You asked for it, Roxanne," a cool professional voice said.

"I didn't ask for it to friggin' hurt, you quack!"

"I'm your doctor. I would appreciate a little respect for my profession."

"And I would appreciate a little respect for my problems."

"Just a minute. I need to recharge this needle."

"Make sure you dip it in alcohol. I don't wanna catch AIDS from one of my alters. I got enough problems trying to get myself knocked up."

As the doctor returned to his black bag, Roxanne grabbed a gold-inlaid hand mirror and lifted it to her face. She examined herself critically. The bags under her eyes were still gone. She didn't know whether to be pleased or annoyed. If the bags never came back, she got her money's worth. On the other hand, if just the tiniest puff showed, she could turn about and sue the bastard plastic surgeon who performed the operation. He had cost her a bundle, and although he'd done a good job, her latest husband had still run off with another woman.

"It's so unfair," she whined.

"What is?" the doctor asked.

"Life. Life is unfair."

"I know what you mean," the doctor said absently as he recharged the needle with perganonal, a powerful female hormone that invariably sent Roxanne's moods swinging like a five-hundred-pound gorilla on a chandelier.

"I so, so want to get preggers. Why can't I get preggers?"

"Because you had your tubes tied ten years ago," the doctor said flatly.

"Is that any frigging reason?"

"Normally, yes."

"Well, I got 'em untied, didn't I?"

"I counseled you the original operation might not be reversible."

"Well, I paid enough to have it done. Now look at me. I got track marks all over my butt just because in a weak moment I let some butcher root around in my guts."

"I'm ready with the second shot."

"Just work around the tattoo."

"Which one?"

"Any one. I don't want track marks on my tattoos. Vanity Fair's gonna photograph them for next month's cover."

"Good Lord," the doctor said.

"What's 'a matter?" asked Roxanne, giving her backside a meaty smack. "Don't you think I got a nice butt?"

"It's ... colorful," the doctor admitted, his eyes averting to her creased back. It was no more appetizing. All those pimples and inflamed sebaceous cysts.

Roxanne's mood suddenly darkened. "Says you. Now hurry and shoot me up. I can take it. I used to do heroin."

The needle went in slowly; the plunger discharged the syringe's contents while, lying on her stomach, Roxanne Roeg-Elephante gritted her capped teeth and said, "Life is so unfair. I just want to have children. I need to know true motherhood."

"How are your children from your first marriage, by the way?" the doctor asked.

"Grown-up and calling up for money all the time. The ones who still talk to me, that is. Forget them. They don't count on account I had them with a jerk and before I was famous. I want a baby. One that doesn't talk back."

Closing up his bag, the doctor said, "I'll leave my bill with your personal assistant."

"Go ahead. But if those hormones don't work, I'm suing your ass for mispractice."

"You have a nice day, too, Roxanne," the doctor said tightly, exiting the dressing room on the lot of Omniversal Studios in North Hollywood, California.

And lying on her stomach, Roxanne Roeg-Elephante laid her apple red cheek against the pillow, muttering, "Life is so fucking unfair. I'm practically a billionaire and I can't hardly get what I want."

"What do you want, Roxanne?" asked a strange voice coming from her mouth.

Picking up the mirror, Roxanne began talking to it. "I dunno. But I know I ain't got it yet. What do you want, alter?"

"Sex. Lots of it."

"Me, too. But Studley isn't here."

"Too bad," said the disembodied voice.

"I wonder if a person with multiple personalities can have sex with herself?" Roxanne wondered suddenly.

"I'm not having sex with you!"

"Why not, alter?"

"I'm no dyke."

"Speak for yourself. There ain't nothing I ain't tried-or will try-if I think it will make me happy or someone I hate miserable."