Warren Murphy: Sole Survivor

Anna Chutesov had already disappeared inside. Remo spotted her at the end of a dim passageway. She looked back and waved him on.

Remo followed, noticing that on either side of the passage, a copper line, like a transistor radio circuit, ran the length of both walls. He wondered why it would be exposed like that, then saw that Anna brushed either line casually as she walked, and he knew the wires must be safe.

"Wait up," he called after her.

"There is no time," she called back. "Hurry."

Remo followed her into a room that was completely dark. His eyes adjusted instantly. He saw Anna Chutesov's dim figure disappear through a door.

Remo stepped through. The next room was full of mellow golden light.

Anna Chutesov stood off to one side. She stood with her fingertips touching the continuous copper line, and Remo noticed that the tips of her fingers, like the wire, were coppery.

"Hello is all right," Anna Chutesov said in the voice of Mr. Gordons.

"You never did learn to talk right, tin man," Remo said. And because he knew that the real Anna Chutesov had to be dead, he started in on Gordons without wasting another moment.

The voice of the Master of Sinanju stopped him. "Remo!" Chiun called. "Go back! Do you hear me? Go back."

Remo, distracted, turned to the sound of his voice. He saw a panorama of a lunar landscape, artificial rock and craters dotting the floor. From the ground, stalagmites rose like spiny needles, and over his head stars twinkled against a glassy black sky and planets loomed gigantically.

In the middle of the ceiling hung the planet Saturn, a silvery ball crowned by a yellow ring.

And immediately below Saturn, clinging to a needle of stone and clawing like a cat for the ringed planet, was the Master of Sinanju.

"Chiun! You okay?" Remo called.

"I hear disappointment shouting in a loud voice, asking me if I am okay," Chiun said angrily. "I am not okay. I am risking my life to protect an idiot. Go! Save your seed."

Before Remo could answer, his vision exploded in a starburst of pain.

Gordons had struck the first blow.

Remo stepped back, weaved to avoid a second, killing blow, and steeled himself. He knew he was facing Mr. Gordons, his old enemy. But Mr. Gordons looked exactly like Anna Chutesov. That would make it harder.

"Remo. Go this instant!" Chiun cried, his cheeks puffing out with rage. "I will handle this."

"After I settle this little score," Remo said. He lunged for Gordons' chest. The blow sent sparks flying, but Mr. Gordons remained on his feet. The android clutched at the wall for support, feeling the copper wire, then came on.

Remo knew from past experience that the element containing Gordons' intelligence, the nearly indestructible control circuits, were not always located in the same part of his mechanical body. They could be hidden in the android's head, throat, elbow-even in his little finger. Stopping Gordons meant locating and immobilizing that motivating element.

Remo decided not to waste time.

"I'm going to show you a new game," he said. "It's called process of elimination."

He jumped back, bounced off the wall, and kicked against Gordons' chest with both feet. Gordons fell. Remo landed on top of him. He took off the android's right arm with a vicious chop. Gordons, squealing like a tape recorder, swept Remo aside with the other arm.

"Nope, it's not in that arm," Remo said, getting back his legs.

"Remo! Go!" Chiun called in anguish. He was at the tip of the stone needle, within reach of the planet Saturn, which Remo understood was the Sword of Damocles satellite in disguise.

The needle slowly sank into the floor, taking Chiun with it. The Master of Sinanju leapt to another needle as the artificial planet began to revolve in Remo's direction. Its bottom dropped open to reveal its toothlike microwave emitters.

"Remo, it is pointing at you!" Chiun cried. "Run now. We will fight this creature another day."

"Nothing doing," said Remo. "He got Anna. And I'm going to get him."

"I did not want to fight you," Mr. Gordons said. "I would have been content to outlive you, knowing that the House of Sinanju ended with you."

"There isn't room for both of us on this planet," said Remo.

"I will remember your words when I watch the last human being die," said Mr. Gordons, raising his remaining fist.

Remo ducked under Gordons' balled fist, and bobbed up behind him. He batted Gordons' head off. It flew to the other side of the room like a puppet whose string had been jerked.

"Nope. Not in the head either," said Remo.

Mr. Gordons staggered around in circles until he bumped into the wall. He groped for the copper line. When he found it, his jerky movements straightened.

Remo, unaware that the Sword of Damocles' emitters were zeroing in on him, moved in for the kill.

The Master of Sinanju felt his fingernails scratch the Sword of Damocles. The touch was brief. Then, once again, the stalagmite on which he stood retracted into the moonscape floor.

He leapt to the floor, where he swiftly considered the situation. He could rush to Remo's side and pull him from the room and possibly save him from Gordons' mad attack. But that would still leave the hellish device. It would burn the vitality from his pupil's loins before he crossed the room. The Master of Sinanju hesitated.

Then he noticed an object at his feet. It looked like the head of Anna Chutesov, but its neck ended in a cluster of wires and optical fibers.

The Master of Sinanju swept the head up by its blond hair and sent it flying. He had made his decision. Remo waited for the next blow. When it came, he moved back from it, taking Gordons' remaining wrist in a two-handed grip. He pulled, turning the momentum of the android's thrust against him in a throw that was too perfect to be mere judo. It was Sinanju.

Gordons went flying. His hand came off at the wrist. Mr. Gordons staggered toward the wall, toward the copper wire that ran around the room.

Remo stepped in ahead of the jerking automaton and yanked a length of the copper filament from the wall, breaking the circuit.

The body of Mr. Gordons collapsed in a heap. "Yep," Remo said, pleased with himself. "It was in the left hand this time."

"And you are out of your mind," said the Master of Sinanju angrily, joining him.

Remo turned. "I'm sorry I disobeyed your instructions, Little Father. He made himself look like Anna and said you needed me."

"And you believed him!"

"I didn't stop to think. I just knew that you needed me."

"I need an intelligent pupil, that is what I need," sputtered the Master of Sinanju. "One who has sense enough to obey the wards that come from my lips, not the trickery of an impostor."

"Is that the thanks I get for stopping Gordons?"

"Pah! You did not stop him. I stopped him. Look." Remo saw that the Sword of Damocles satellite was lying in an artificial crater. It was shattered like a dropped Christmas-tree ornament. The head that resembled Anna Chutesov lay to one side, staring glassily through hair that Remo knew had belonged to the real Anna Chutesov. He turned away from the sight.

"You stopped the satellite," said Remo. "I stopped Gordons."

"When I destroyed the round sword, the machine man collapsed. His thinking parts must have been concealed inside."

"No, it was in his hand," Remo insisted. "He dropped in his tracks when I pulled off the hand."

"No," Chiun said firmly. "I saw him stagger for some moments after that. He sought the copper line, which was the connection to his brain. See? The copper line leads to the ceiling and to the hanging cable."

Remo looked. Sure enough, the filament traced along the ceiling and ran into the suspension cable from which the Sword of Damocles had hung.

"No, no," said Remo. "You don't understand electronics. He probably controlled the satellite through the wire."