No Contest

“Dr. Smith,” she said conspiratorially, “received a very unusual package. It was labeled for general delivery, so I opened it for him. I must say…” She seemed unable to finish.

Mark entered Smith’s office, walking slowly.

“What’s the matter?”

‘Remo spent $536 to have this delivered to me by special courier. The evidence? He sent it second-day, economy class.”

“What’s the DVD?” Mark asked. He looked at the montage of vivid images on the cover and raised his eyebrows. “Ah. Nude luge. One of the Extreme Sports Network’s fine productions. I never realized there would be so much blood.”

“I think he shocked a year of life out of Mrs. Mikulka,” Smith muttered.

Chapter 12

“You’re not going to listen to me, so I’m not going to tell you not to come,” Remo explained.

“You’re right, Remo, I would not listen. This is disrespectful behavior on your part.”

They stepped from the massive, glimmering RV into a cordoned-off corner of the All-Mart parking lot. The manager of the All-Mart gave Chiun a cheery wave that was not returned, then he went back to his team of workers working vigorously on the asphalt with scrub brushes.

“What behavior is that? Keeping secrets?”

“Exactly?”

“I learned it from you.”

“Your conspiracy dishonors me, who has given you everything.”

They entered a cab and Remo read an address off his crumpled FedEx receipt, which he stuffed back into the pocket of his Chinos. After a silent cab ride, they stepped onto a sidewalk in Hollywood. If Chiun wanted to tag along, Remo was going to take him sight-seeing.

“Little Father, I’m allowed to have some life. I never agreed to being owned—by you or by Smitty. Another point—I’m supposed to be Reigning Master. I’m supposed to be the one calling the shots.”

“So the time has come to expose my back to the clumsy knife of the new and swollen-headed Master.”

“Come on. Chiun, that’s not the way it is. I’m not new. I’ve had the title for a couple of years now. You can’t say I’ve been throwing my weight around.”

Chiun glared at him.

“Maybe a little. But I’m entitled, aren’t I?”

“Entitled to betrayal?”

“Entitled to actually use some of the authority I’m supposed to have? Entitled to being ticked off at being treated like CURE’S stupid grunt?”

Chiun looked away. “This is a filthy city.”

“You say that about every city.”

“Every city in this land is filthy.”

“Compared to Sinanju? At least we’re not wading in mud and smelling the fish rotting.”

“Smith,” Winner declared.

Smith orchestrated the lies. Smith lived in a world of clandestine operations. He lived in a shadow world.

Once, Winner dwelled in the shadow world himself, but he was a soldier then. A doer. Smith—the Smith who was responsible for the device—was never a doer. He was a watcher, a thinker, a voyeur who issued orders. Somebody, who didn’t even know who Smith was, followed the orders. They deployed the device—and it wasn’t the first such device.

Winner watched this one through the gap in the rock. This one was better than the first one. Some sort of an airship based on a weather-balloon design. It was a translucent blue that should have camouflaged it against the clear skies of Arizona. There was a small electronic pod dangling beneath, with steel claws for gripping.

It wasn’t all that sophisticated, really. Near silent compressed-air canisters jetted it along on a plotted course to whatever target could be reached with the prevailing air currents. The electronics inside would be expensive and the plastic shell would be some sort of military-grade armor.

The first device was air-dropped in the middle of the night onto a rocky hillock well outside of the village. The desert-colored electronic device had righted itself and started listening to the goings-on in the Sun On Jo village.

It didn’t listen long. Smith underestimated Winner and the entire village. Never mind that they used stealth aircraft to deploy the device; they woke everybody up. Winner sprinted in a big circle, came up behind the device and stepped on it.

This new device, he noticed, had video pickups all around it. No sneaking up on this one. That didn’t matter. Winner wasn’t even going to let it get into position.

He grabbed a rock, tossed it lightly in his hand to get a feel for its weight, then leaned around the hilltop and delivered the rock at the dangling plastic device.

It sensed him instantly and began to program evasive maneuvers, releasing compressed gas from its jets as the rock slammed into the plastic shell. The ceramic-reinforced carbon-fiber shell fell into the desert in little pieces.

The thing was designed for a direct hit, and the electronics inside were exposed but still intact. The airship was making a valiant attempt at escape.

Winner tossed the beer can next. The can hit the device and burst open. The device did the same thing that any cheap boom box would do with beer spilled into its guts—it stopped working forever.