Part 17 (2/2)

Two feet...

No choice.

One foot...

Remo slapped his hand out.

The whistling bomb was at chest level now. He caught the nose of the 75 mm sh.e.l.l with carefully cupped ?ngers.

Slow the descent. Turn the bomb around.

Remo felt the rough, corroded surface of the unexploded sh.e.l.l through every nerve ending in his hand. Fingertips became suction cups. A variation of the technique that allowed him to climb sheer faces. Using the coa.r.s.e bomb exterior for leverage, Remo whipped the explosive device back in the direction it had come.

The entire sequence took a split second to perform. The sh.e.l.l soared back up through the open bay doors of the Heinkel just as the aircraft began to drop another small handful of bombs.

There was a muf?ed explosion deep within the belly of the plane. Another distant sound of a single detonating sh.e.l.l was followed by an eerie second of silence.

All at once the huge aircraft erupted in a ma.s.sive ball of ?ame. Smoking metal fragments exploded in every direction as ?re tore down the length of the fatally wounded plane.

Lord Nelson became a s.h.i.+eld. Remo ducked behind the statue as it was pelted with hundreds of chunks of jagged steel.

The Heinkel tore out of the sky with a pained scream, cras.h.i.+ng solidly against the seventh ?oor of a ten-story building on the far side of the square. The nose buckled; the wings snapped forward into the brick walls and then sheared loose. Another explosion followed, after which the Heinkel's tail section ripped away and plummeted in a ?aming ma.s.s to the street below.

What remained of the plane jutted out above the square. A burning hulk.

”Now, that was a plan,” Remo announced to Lord Nelson.

Brus.h.i.+ng the rusted metal fragments from his hand, he climbed swiftly back down to the ground.RAF JETS INTERCEPTED the German warplanes above London at 12:25, Greenwich mean time. By most estimates, that was precisely twenty-?ve minutes after the attack had begun.

Rockets blazed into the sides of the woefully outmatched IV air force. Crippled and burning planes ?ew nose ?rst from the hazy afternoon sky.

Most buildings and tourist attractions from Oxford Street to Const.i.tution Hill and from Shaftesbury Avenue to Park Lane had sustained some kind of damage.

Some police were on the scene in riot gear. More were arriving every minute. Sirens sounded in every direction.

Fires raged in several ravaged buildings as Remo made his way around the periphery of the neo-n.a.z.i defenses.

Many of the skinheads he dispatched were clearly in some altered state of mind. The bodies of their innocent victims lay everywhere around the smoke-?lled square. For this reason alone, Remo continued to battle his way through the thinning troops.

A trio of men in an alley was ?ring against an unseen a.s.sailant near a burned-out car. Remo leaped into the middle of the dazed group of skinheads. His presence had barely registered to them before he was spinning on one heel.

With a triple crack, Remo brought both forearms and one knee against each man simultaneously. They were dead before they hit the ground. Remo slipped out of the alley.

Whoever had been ?ring on the three skinheads from behind the car had changed direction. The machine gun was now shooting at a group of men in SS uniforms ?eeing for the nearest Tube entrance. Several of them dropped to the street, mortally wounded.

Remo a.s.sumed the shooter was with the police. He was trotting past the car when he was startled by something familiar about the ?gure crouching at its charred rear b.u.mper. He stopped dead.

”Smitty?” Remo asked, shocked.

Harold Smith glanced once at Remo, his expression cross. Looking back to the ?eeing German troops, Smith resumed ?ring.

At that moment the Master of Sinanju came racing into sight from the opposite direction. Seeing his pupil, he ran over to join him.

Chiun nodded. ”You have found Emperor Smith.”

”Sort of,” Remo answered uncertainly. ”Okay, Smitty, let me have it,” he said gently.

Remo tugged the gun from Smith's hands, tossing it to the sidewalk. Smith immediately grabbed for the gun slung over his shoulder. Remo took that one, too.

”They're getting away!” Smith snapped. He started to give chase to the ?eeing troops, but powerful hands restrained him. When he turned, he found the Master of Sinanju holding ?rmly on to his biceps.

”You are a valiant warrior, O Emperor. But the pinheads are undone.”

”They're not getting away,” Remo promised. ”Not dressed like that. It's over.”

Smith glanced from Remo to Chiun. All at once the ?ght seemed to drain out of him.

”Yes,” he exhaled. ”Yes, I suppose you're right.”

Remo looked around the area. The street was a littered mess. Several bodies-both skinhead and civilian-lay about the roadway.

Bullet holes riddled the walls. Shattered gla.s.s lay everywhere. Nearby, the wreckage of an Me-109E burned freely. Plumes of black smoke rose into the gray sky.

”Is this what it was like before?” Remo wondered aloud.”No.” Smith was in the midst of adjusting his tie. ”It was far worse,” he said tartly, brus.h.i.+ng dirt from his sleeve.

”We've got to get these guys, Smitty,” Remo said softly.

No one seemed to hear him. A thought had suddenly occurred to Smith.

”Maude! I left her in the Underground.” He started across the street.

”I will accompany you,” Chiun announced. He trailed Smith back to the subway entrance.

Remo stood for a few moments longer, staring at the wreckage around him. Smoke and ?re raged, sirens wailed.

Before leaving home a few short days before, he had been struggling internally with his life as CURE's enforcement arm. It seemed like a lifetime ago.

Maybe he couldn't stamp out every last bit of evil in the world, but that didn't mean he should stop trying.

Smith was right. Conrad MacCleary had been right.

”One man can make a difference,” Remo declared ?rmly. He resolved at that moment, looking at the grisly results of a reviled, decades-old evil, that-in this case-one man would do just that.

There was no way these people were going to get away with this. No way at all.

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