Warren Murphy: Last Rites

"I understand you've been bothering the stewardesses."

"Not me," Remo said defensively.

"It is a federal offense to tamper with the crew of a commercial carrier, sir. Especially in flight."

"Okay, okay, I'll do it. Anything to get some peace and quiet." Remo stood up. "Is that all right with everybody?"

The stewardess in her underwear piped up from the floor. "Yes!" It was very a enthusiastic yes. Reluctantly Remo escorted her to the galley, and the stewardess stood with her eyes closed and her cleavage thrust forward as if on a serving platter.

"You may begin wherever you like," she murmured. Remo lifted her left hand by the wrist and turned it over.

"Oooh, I feel shivery already."

"Me, too," Remo said without enthusiasm. Holding the underside of her wrist up, Remo began tapping on it methodically.

"Whatever you're doing, keep it up."

"It's called foreplay."

"I never had foreplay like this."

"And you never will again," said Remo.

"Oh, don't say that!"

Remo continued tapping, achieving a rhythm and bringing it higher and higher until the fleshy face of the stewardess began to tighten like a fine clock being wound.

This was the first in the thirty-seven steps to sexual fulfillment the Master of Sinanju had taught Remo long ago. There was a sensitive nerve in the human wrist, unsuspected by Gloria Steinem, that could be manipulated until a woman achieved a delicious kind of whole-body orgasm.

At least that was how it sounded to the expectant passengers and crew of the TWA 747 when the stewardess's screams of pleasure began rolling down the aisles and back up again like a very long wave sloshing between two stone jetties.

When Remo stepped out from the galley, he was greeted with a standing ovation.

The other stewardesses began lining up with expectant faces.

"Sorry. One orgasm per flight," said Remo, brushing past them and sliding back into his seat, next to the Master of Sinanju, who sat with his hands clapped over his delicate ears.

"It's over," Remo told him.

Chiun removed his hands. "It is disgusting what these white women will do."

"Actually she tended more to olive skinned."

"Green is not a healthy color, but for a white it is healthier than the fish-belly coloring you unfortunate people are cursed with."

Twenty minutes later they landed at Kennedy International Airport, and no one got off. Instead, the empty seats filled up.

The black-haired stewardess was carried unconscious out of the galley and poured into a jumpseat, where she smiled dreamily all through the flight over the Atlantic.

"So, where are we going?"

"Iberia."

"Oh, yeah? What's in Iberia?"

"Us. Provided the wings do not fall off."

TWO HOURS over the Atlantic, Remo had read every magazine and was bored. The stewardesses started looking at him with appealing eyes, and they kept moistening their lips with their tongues until their mouths became pale and their tongues turned assorted Maybelline colors.

So Remo pretended to sleep in his seat. And because he was bored, he willed himself to drop off.

Remo Williams dreamed.

In the dream he was standing before a cave. It was an impenetrable black maw, but as he stood before the opening, mists began rolling toward him with a hungry eagerness.

Remo tried to peer past the white swirl to see what was making mist emerge from a cave, but he saw only more vapor.

The mist was white, vaporous, ghostly. It shone with an inner luminance.

And deep within the cave, Remo heard the approaching sound of a beating human heart.

"Who's in there?" Remo asked in his dream. The heartbeat continued its approach.

In his dream Remo's own heartbeat began to accelerate. He willed it to stabilize.

"Who's in there?" Remo repeated.

The mist suddenly regathered, intensified and filled the cave entrance like flowing cotton spiderwebs. When it was as opaque as milk, it started to swirl outward. Remo dropped into a defensive posture, legs bent at the knees, hands hovering at his belt line, right hand a fist, left a spear point of stiffened fingers. When the man stepped out, he seemed to be clothed in mist. Smoky tendrils clung to his lean, wiry form. "Who the hell are you?" Remo asked.

"I am the first," he said in a hollow, dead voice. "The first what?"

"The first," repeated the tiny man dressed in mist.

"What do you want?" Remo demanded, keeping his guard up.

"You must best me. If you can."

Remo grunted a confident laugh. "I could take you with both hands tied behind my back."

"That you must prove," said the man dressed in mist. Only then did Remo get a good look at his face. It was Asian. The man had no eyes. The loose skin of his eyelids were sunken hollows and stitched shut with catgut. He advanced purposefully.

Remo watched his movements, and the phrase that came to his mind was cream puff.

The eyeless man walked right into a nerve punch that compressed his entire rib cage, exploded the air from his lungs and laid him flat on his back.

As the mist from the cave strove forward to wash over him, the blind Asian intoned, "I was only the first."

"Good for you," said Remo, eyes snapping open.

"WHAT IS GOOD FOR ME?" asked Chiun, turning in his seat.

The dull whine of jet engines filled Remo's ears. "Nothing. I was dreaming."

"Quickly!" Chiun clutched Remo's arm. "What did the hussy say this time?"

"Let go of me. She didn't say anything. I didn't dream of her. Not that last time was a dream."

"You dreamed?"

"Yes."

"Sitting here next to me with a full six hours of sleep from last night and another ten minutes on top of that, you dreamed?"

"Yes, I dreamed. Break my saber in two and tear off my chevrons, I dreamed."

Chiun regarded his pupil with narrowing eyes. "Of what did you dream, Remo?" he asked, thin voiced.

"Nothing."

"Speak!"

"A cave. I dreamed of a cave."

"You had another vision?"

"I don't think it was the same cave. Anyway, I didn't go in to find out."

"Good. If you dream of that cave again, do not enter it. If you disobey me, then do not tell me what you saw in that cave, for I do not want to know. Unless it is very important, of course."

"Something came out of the cave."

"What?"

"A guy."

"Guy? What kind of guy? Speak his name."

"He didn't give one. He challenged me to a fight for no reason."

"And what happened?"

Remo shrugged unconcernedly. "What do you think? I laid him flat with one shot."

"Ah," said Chiun. "Good. You killed him"

"Nah. I just laid him out."

"Why did you say 'Good for you' in your sleep?"

"He said he was only the first."

Chiun's eyes suddenly thinned to unreadable slits. "What did this man look like, my son?"

"He was Asian. Looked like someone gouged his eyes out and stitched the lids shut."

Chiun nodded to himself. "Was this man Korean?"

Remo shook his head. "Maybe. But he was covered in mist."

"Mist?"

"Yeah, mist. There was mist coming from the cave. It clung to him. That was the weird part. He was dressed in white mist. Wonder what that means."

"Why should it mean anything?" snapped Chiun.

"I read an article about dreams a few months back," Remo said. "Scientists say they're the unconscious mind's way of processing the day's events, mixing them with fantasy and crazy stuff so the brain can work through its fears and concerns."

"Pah. White superstitions."

"You should talk. You think I'm the reincarnation of Shiva the Destroyer."

"You are."

"And of an old Sinanju Master named Lu."

"You are Lu, too."

"I'm Remo Williams and I haven't had a real dream about Sinanju that I can remember since the Dream of Death. That's gotta be over ten years ago."