Warren Murphy: Rain of Terror

Smith pushed back his chair and went into the well of his desk. He pulled several flat gray connecting cables from a plate in the floor. With swift motions he reconnected them to his desk terminal. Then he returned to his seat.

"Check the Gibraltar situation," Remo suggested.

"I don't have full global capabilities anymore, but domestic news feeds have been issuing hourly bulletins." Smith called up the data.

"Odd," he said, small-voiced.

Remo and Chiun looked at one another knowingly.

"I see no bulletins," Smith went on. "And there are reports of strange phenomena all over this country. My God, it seems as if there may have been several new KKV strikes. But the other computer reported none of those. What can it mean?"

"Never trust a computer that talks back," Remo said.

"But it was so ... so perfect."

"A lot of women seem that way ... at first," Chiun told him wisely.

"Let's get to work on the locomotive matter," Remo suggested.

"But where do I start? I have nothing current in memory."

"Use this," Remo said, tapping Smith's forehead. "It's better than any computer mind. It's called your brain."

"Start with a desert kingdom. And a passionate prince," Chiun suggested.

"What?"

"Chiun thinks they're throwing locomotives because they don't have rocks," Remo said skeptically.

"I have to start somewhere," Smith said with a sigh. Chiun struck out his tongue at Remo.

"Let's see," Smith muttered. "We'll begin with the Africa connection. Desert kingdom. Must be North Africa. The Egyptians are our friends. The Algerians go both ways. Lobynia ... Lobynia. Passionate prince . . ."

"I thought Lobynia was in the Middle East," Remo said.

"Common mistake."

Remo shrugged. "Colonel Intifadah, yeah. Could be him."

"Let's see what satellite tracking tells us," Smith said. "I'm calling up Spacetrack satellite feeds for the last two weeks."

"What are you looking for?" Remo asked.

"I don't know. Wait, yes. Now, why didn't I think of this before?"

"You were in love," Chiun supplied.

"Nonsense. But as I was saying. When we suspect the Soviets are about to launch a satellite, we can usually tell by power drops in the surrounding area. This creates what is called a period of interest. Yes, the Lobynians have been experiencing unusual power outages."

"Why didn't anyone notice this before?" Remo wanted to know.

"The Lobynians are always experiencing power outages. But what I want to see is if these outages can be reconciled with the known launch times. Yes, yes! Dapoli was blacked out seven times in the last fourteen hours. Now, let's see if the New York strike ties in. Yes. And the second Washington strike." Smith stopped speaking. He was lost in his work.

Remo watched with interest. Smith's fingers played like a concert pianist's. He was totally focused. Data blocks passed before his eyes at high speed. Amazingly, Smith seemed to absorb them at a glance. It made Remo wonder why Smith thought he needed a computer to help him think. The man was a wizard.

Finally Smith lifted his head. It was gray, leaden. "Lobynia. There is no question of it. The blackouts coincide exactly."

"But where in Lobynia?" Remo asked.

"Except for the area bordering the Mediterranean, Lobynia is a virtual desert. If they're moving the engines to the launch site by rail, as one would suppose they would do, then there should be visible tracks. This is so obvious, why didn't it occur to me before?"

"Because before, the whole world was your suspect," said Chiun. "I have told you about the desert kingdom and the passionate prince."

"Even so . . ." said Smith. His voice trailed off again. On the terminal, satellite photos flashed before Smith's eyes. They were on the screen for only a second each. "There!" Smith cried, hitting a key. A photo froze on the screen. "Look."

Remo and Chiun crowded close. "Tracks," Chiun said.

"Going through the desert," Remo added. "But they stop in the middle of nowhere.'

"Not nowhere," Smith pointed out. "See that shadow? They must disappear into a bunker or underground complex. Of course, for the launcher to hurl a locomotive thousands of miles, it would have to be extraordinarily long. It's probably concealed under the sand."

"Well, let's go," Remo said.

"I'll get a helicopter," Smith said, reaching for the telephone.

"You'll be on an Air Force jet within the hour." He stopped suddenly. "This phone is dead."

"Better use the pay phone downstairs," Remo suggested. "The world can't wait while you call for a repairman."

"Yes, I will. But I do not understand. This phone came highly recommended."

"That's the biz," Remo said airly.

Chapter 31

Colonel Hannibal Intifadah watched the work from a safe distance.

The 135-ton Kolomna locomotive had been halted well away from the underground-complex entrance. The tubular boiler had been laid open and workers partitioned it so that the steam combustion chamber lay in two sections. They were sealing it now.

Then, donning protective masks and garments, they pumped in the nerve-gas components through hastily installed valves on top. One agent into the forward section, the other in the rear, making the entire locomotive a binary nerve-gas projectile on wheels. They were harmless now. But when the massive locomotive crashed, the boiler would rupture, the agents would combine, and death would billow up for miles around.

Hamid Al-Mudir came up to report.

"It is done. But, Brother Colonel, we still cannot open the third container. It defies every tool."

"Malesh," Colonel Intifadah said. "No matter. Bring it below. Phase one is completed. Let us go to phase two." They loaded the container onto the jeep and Colonel Intifadah drove into the bunker, down the sloping tunnel, careful to avoid the ruler-straight rail tracks, and into the launch-preparation area.

There, his workers were carefully readying another engine.

Pyotr Koldunov woke up slowly. He could not move his arms. They felt numb. When his vision focused, he understood why.

He was strung up like a plucked chicken. Wire hawsers kept his arms raised above his head. He was on his knees.

The floor felt cold. And in front of him a black hatch lay open to a deeper blackness. It was surrounded by a maze of pipes and gauges and dials.

"What?" he groaned.

"Surely you recognize it," Colonel Intifadah's voice asked. Pyotr Koldunov turned his stiff neck around.

Colonel Intifadah was looking up at him, resplendent in a pea-green uniform.

"Look again, comrade," he suggested.

Pyotr Koldunov looked. And understood. He was staring at the open firebox of a boiler. His arms hung from the maze of pipes overhead. He was in the cab of a vintage steam engine.

"Oh, no. No, Brother Colonel."

"I do not need you, Koldunov," Colonel Intifada said. "But it will please you to know that you will do me a great service in your last hours."

"No, please."

"We have just filled a locomotive with nerve gas. Fully loaded, it weighs the same as this engine-plus one hundred and fifty pounds."

"I do not understand."

"I will make it clear to you, Russian," said Colonel Intifadah. "You know better than I that the weight of one of these brutes affects where it will land. I need to know where this locomotive will impact before I send its brother aloft. Just in case this one goes into the ocean, where it will kill only fishes. If so, then I will correct the launcher's aim. But I need that additional one hundred and fifty pounds of ballast. And I do not need you."

Colonel Intifadah threw his head back and laughed like a hyena.

Pyotr Koldunov hung his head. He did not plead for his life. The Colonel's crazed laugh told him it was useless to do so. Instead, he closed his eyes and heard the sounds as Colonel Intifadah exhorted his men to load the engine into the breech.