He immediately saw the thick metal barrel jutting from the stone. Beyond this was another. And a third, fourth and fifth. Each of the weird gun muzzles was aimed down the path. Directly at Remo and Chiun.
"Oh, great," was all Remo had time to say before the muzzles hidden in the rock flashed to life. All five of them exploded in a deafeningly violent, unified blast.
They weren't controlled by human hands, so Remo hadn't felt the telltale sign of men about to shoot. Before he had properly prepared for an attack, the air was suddenly alive with burning lead fragments.
More rounds screamed at him in that one instant than at any other single time in his life. His senses were strained to overloading as he flung himself to a protective outcropping of rock beside the road.
The outcropping did not shelter him for long. As soon as he had hunkered down behind the great black stones, the blond-haired IV soldiers in the field aross the road broke their cease-fire. As one, they opened fire on Remo.
He slid down behind the rocks, pushing himself low behind a small lip. Bullets whizzed like angry hornets above his head, ricocheting off rocks and whizzing into the distance.
Remo was a sitting duck.
He didn't know where Chiun had gone to when the automated weapons had begun firing. Remo only hoped that the Master of Sinanju was faring better than him.
CHIUN HAD DONE much the same thing as Remo when the guns had begun their automatic firing. Unlike Remo, however, he had the fortune of landing in a crevice that was the sole blind spot of the nearest machine gun.
As the men in the field opened fire on Remo, Chiun quickly scampered around the far side of the large finger of rock behind which he had taken refuge.
He came out close to the nearest gun. It continued firing relentlessly, deafeningly down the path. But though it tracked from side to side with relative ease, it had more difficulty moving up and down.
Out on the road once more, Chiun ducked below the barrage of lead. He skittered crab-like to the left, coming up between the first two weapons.
They were altered versions of the GEC Minigun. Each was capable of firing 6000 rounds per minute. The pockmarked road was testament to the effectiveness of the weapons.
Racing up alongside the automated guns, Chiun ducked in behind. With two slaps from one longnailed hand, Chiun broke the heavy guns loose from their moorings. Two sharp kicks sent them spinning over in the direction of the small army.
The firing guns swept across the advancing mob of blond-haired men. Crumpling bodies spit streaks of crimson across the lush green field.
There was no defense against the remorseless attack of the automated guns. Some tried to run. Most didn't have the time to even consider the option. In seconds, the grisly deed was done.
As the bullet-riddled bodies fell, Chiun worked to disable the remaining three guns. By the time he had reduced them to pieces and returned to the road, the first two weapons had grown silent.
He climbed down to the path. The dying echoes of machine-gun fire sighed forlornly against the distant peaks of the Andes, fading to an eerie silence.
The entire IV army lay dead on the road. Not one man had survived the fierce gunfire.
Across the road from the nearest dozen bodies, Remo came out from his protective outcropping of rock. He ran up to meet the Master of Sinanju, his face growing more severe as he beheld the breadth of the carnage. He paused next to Chiun, looking up at the ancient temple.
"Let's finish this," he said, hollow of voice.
They turned to the huge stone fortress.
The road ended at a long stone bridge, a remarkable piece of ancient construction spanning the two peaks of the IV complex.
Remo and Chiun were nearly to the bridge when an odd expression crossed the face of the younger Master of Sinanju.
"Wait a sec," Remo said, stopping abruptly. His bare forearm barred Chiun's path.
Chiun frowned even as he stopped beside his pupil. "What is it?" he asked impatiently.
Remo squinted at the bridge, uncertainty clouding his features. "Didn't you feel-?"
He never finished the question.
A powerful rumble rose from beneath their feet. The vibrations were different from those of land mines or machine guns. This was something muffled and heavy.
And as both men watched, each one knowing now what Remo had heard, the bridge before them began to collapse.
The carefully buried charges tore huge slabs of the bridge away. The massive chunks of rock tumbled in slow motion to the ravine floor more than a half mile below.
The wide gap the crashing stone left behind was too great for even a Master of Sinanju to traverse.
ADOLF KLUGE removed his finger from the single red button. He turned to Herman.
"We should go," he said. His face was stone. Herman seemed shell-shocked. He nodded numbly to the IV leader. Together, they left the monitor room, heading farther into the bowels of the ancient temple.
REMO RAN back to the village in order to find something to bridge the gap left by the collapsed bridge. He returned after a few moments with a long extension ladder.
Extending the ladder fully, Remo lowered it across the ravine.
Unmindful of the dizzying height, he and Chiun raced across the aluminum ladder and into the temple.
Remo was surprised when they encountered no resistance inside the huge, drafty fortress. He commented on this to the Master of Sinanju.
"This Kluge is wise," Chiun said knowingly as they raced through the cool stone corridors, "Fearful for his life, a prince would ordinarily surround himself with guards. He realized that his greatest safety lay in sending his entire legion against us."
"Fat lot of good it did him," Remo commented. They found the monitor room, which had been abandoned. Remo immediately identified the pungent odor of nervous sweat.
"That way," he said, pointing to a narrow hallway off the large stone room.
He and Chiun ran through the cramped space and into a much larger chamber.
This had been the main sacrificial room for the priests of the ancient temple. A rock stairway led up the side of a huge pyramid-shaped stone structure in the center of the room. The sacrificial pit.
Obviously the previous occupants of the temple hadn't limited themselves to animal oblations. Cracked, brownish human skulls lined the ancient rock steps.
"I love what they've done with the place," Remo said dryly.
"Shh," Chiun hissed. He was listening intently to something distant.
Remo cocked an ear. He heard the sound, as well. It was very faint. And hollow.
Exchanging glances, Remo and Chiun flew side by side up the stairs to the sacrificial pit.
They found what they had expected at the top. There was a deep black hole in which the dead victims of the temple priests had been dumped. Far below-much farther than the floor of the chamber itself--could be seen the reflective glow of dull yellow light.