Warren Murphy: Dying Space

"Mrs. Miller," he said at her closed apartment door. A bullet whizzed through the wood. "Mrs. Miller, I want to get rid of those hoodlums down there."

"You? What do you think I'm trying to do?" came the reply from behind the door.

"I think I can do it."

"How? Magic? They're like roaches, these twerps."

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I "Just leave that to me. All I want you to do is to stop shooting for five minutes."

"Go pull your pudding."

"Five minutes. Honest. Could you get all the tenants to stay in their apartments and stop shooting for five minutes?"

"What for?"

"So I can have a clear field."

"You got a bazooka? You going to blow the place up? This is my home, you know. Twenty-five years I'm here. You think I want you should blow up my house?" From inside the apartment he heard her fire another round at the courtyard.

"Nothing like that. How about it? Five minutes, that's all."

"Well ..." He heard her footsteps pad toward the door. Presently an eye appeared on the other side of the bullet hole.

"What's your name?"

"Remo."

"You Jewish?" she asked.

"I don't know. I'm an orphan."

"Oh, you poor baby. You married, maybe?"

"No, I'm not married."

"A nice-looking boy like you ought to be married."

"I hope to be someday, ma'am."

"Really?"

"Really. Will you help me out?"

"Well," she repeated. After a few seconds she bellowed, "Listen, you tenants. This is Mrs. Miller talking. I want you should all quit shooting for five minutes."

A rumble issued from the locked apartments of

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the complex. "Shut up and listen. Just five minutes, so this nice, young maybe Jewish boy can do something about the twerps, okay?"

More grumbling. Laughter from the twerps in the courtyard. But no gunfire. "Okay, boychik," Mrs. Miller whispered through the bullethole. "You come back alive, maybe I let you go out with my niece Sheila, such a cook."

"Thank you, Mrs. Miller," Remo said on his way down the staircase. Two twerps in leather were waiting for him on the first landing.

"You know, you guys really are like roaches," he said.

"And you're like dead," one of the twerps answered, flashing a switchblade at Remo. In a second the man's arm was in Remo's own, and the blade thrust, formed a Z on the stomach of his astonished companion, and then disappeared down the man's throat.

"Wrong again, Zorro," Remo said, and sealed the door to the building with a kick that pressed the wood of the doors into the concrete of the walls.

"Allee Allee in come free," Remo called as he raced from one building to the next, flushing out the street warriors into the courtyard. All but the two Joses from 181st Street, who were scrubbing walls with the fervor of zealots.

When they had all gathered, their weapons in tow, Remo spoke.

"Boo," he said.

They charged. For once, the rival gangs performed in perfect concert against the invading

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thin man with no weapons but his hands. They slashed, they fired, they threw.

Some even fought fairly. Remo saw to it that they were taken care of quickly, with no pain, even though he knew the reason they were fighting fairly was because they were either out of ammunition or weapons. Still, it didn't hurt to be lenient, he thought proudly. After all, how many chances did an assassin get to be a nice guy?

"Not this time," he said as he poked his index finger into the frontal lobe of a black with a knife. "Not this time," he said as he dislocated both arms of a haiiy behemoth with a gun in each hand. "Maybe now," he said when a slender Puerto Rican approached him with his hands behind his back. Then he saw the tip of the Colt .350 peeking over the man's shoulder. "Nope, guess not," Remo said as he kicked the man's Adam's apple into his brain.

"You got one minute, twenty seconds," Mrs. Miller screeched from her window.

Remo speeded up, taking the thugs at double-time. Kick, thrust, poke, elbow, head attack, pull them level, inside-line attack, toe, hip attack, upper arm, heel, third-finger attack, knee, rib attack, easy on the upswing, fourth finger.

It was done. Chiun would have been proud. He had used nearly every basic attack known in Sinanju. Chiun would have praised him. He would be honored to have taught Remo. He would have said ...

"Tsk, tsk, tsk," came the familiar clucks from behind. "Always is the elbow bent. Do you never learn? Why, oh why, do I waste the invaluable

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wisdom of the Master of Sinanju on a worthless pupil such as you?"

Remo whirled around. "Chiun. What are you doing—"

"You left one," roared Mrs. Miller. "Stand back! I'll get him. You tenants hold your fire. This baby's mine."

"Mrs. Miller, don't," Remo yelled, but he was too late. The machine gun was already propped in her window on a tripod, and the bullets came blazing.

"Little Father-"

"Hush," Chiun said, his wrinkled wizard's face expressionless, his blue silk robes billowing as his hands moved in a blur in front of him.

Remo counted the seconds. Three rounds of ammunition per second—986 . . . 992 . . . 1053 ...

"She is nearly finished," Chiun said, and Remo knew that the ancient Oriental was counting, too. Rhythm and balance. Ralance and movement. Movement and breathing. All were related in the discipline of Sinanju, and Chiun was the Master.

When the count reached 1,600, Remo knew the ammunition would be spent in a matter of seconds. And when the silence finally came, Chiun's tiny figure stood knee-deep in the center of five perfectly formed piles of fired ammunition which, Remo knew, contained exactly 1,000 rounds each.

The tenants stared dumbfounded at the frail old Oriental. "He's a friend of yours, maybe?" Mrs. Miller asked sheepishly.

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"Yes," Remo said. He turned to Chiun. "That was beautiful, Little Father."

"And how many did you catch?" Chiun asked.

"Well, see, I got kind of busy."

"How many?"

Remo remembered the one bullet he had retrieved from the thug in the basement after the man had shot his own.head off. He pulled it out of his pocket. It was gnarled and squashed. Pieces of drying brain tissue clung to it. "Uh, one," Remo said lamely.

"I see." Chiun's tone of voice could have frozen the Gobi Desert.

"I can explain."

"Did I ask for explanations?"

"No, but-"

"Remo, boychik," Mrs. Miller screamed. "Guess who just dropped by with a cake. Sheila!"

'Who?"

"Remember, my niece, such a cook? You want maybe I should introduce you?"

Past Mrs. Miller, Remo could see the hulking frame of a giantess in organdy. And even from where he was standing, he could see the mustache on Sheila's upper lip.

"I'm kind of busy, Mrs. Miller," he said. "But I'll send a friend."

With the woman's protests still within earshot, Remo pushed aside the bodies at the top of the stairwell leading to the basement where he had hidden Archie.

"It's all over, friend," Remo said.

Archie blinked at the sight of Chiun in full Oriental splendor behind Remo.

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"I am Chiun," he said. "Greetings."

Archie smiled. "That's good, 'cause I thought mebbe I died, and you was God."

Outside, Mrs. Miller's shrieks were still audible. "I just want you to do something for me, Archie," Remo said. "I told Mrs. Miller I'd send a friend up to try some of her cake. Will you go?"

Archie slapped his forehead and groaned. "Do I have to?" he whined.

"Aw, come on. It's just a little cake."

"I've had Delphine's cake."

"Delphine?"

"Delphine Miller."

Remo caught his breath. "As in 'For a good time... '?"

Archie nodded. "Call Delphine. Anything to trap some poor slob into meeting that gorilla she's got for a niece."

Remo laughed. "Okay, I'll do it," Archie said. "For you. But I'm not going to like it."