123752.fb2 Infernal Revenue - читать онлайн бесплатно полную версию книги . Страница 68

Infernal Revenue - читать онлайн бесплатно полную версию книги . Страница 68

"No," said Smith.

"Then unless you want your skinny white neck broke, you'll hand over the key and get the fuck outta my phat new van."

Harold Smith picked the ignition key off the monitor.

"Come and get it," he said, his free hand taking the fat end of his dangling tie.

A hail of noise and smoky tracer bullets ripped through Remo Williams’ unprotected chest. He stood unflinching.

"Remo!" Chiun shrieked, leaping to his side.

"Watch this," said Remo.

And before Chiun's astonished eyes, he began catching bullets in his teeth, pretending to spit them out.

Chiun demanded, "What insanity is this? Speak!"

Remo pointed toward the still-firing gunmen and over the din of gunfire shouted, "They're not real."

"But I see them," said Chiun, dodging a shotgun blast.

"Close your eyes, Little Father."

The Master of Sinanju, seeing that the furious bullets of his enemies had no effect on his pupil, obeyed.

To his other senses, the world became a different place. The booming of guns continued. But they were alone in the room. Clearly alone. He opened his eyes again.

"What makes this illusion?"

"I think it's what they're calling virtual reality now."

"There is only one reality, and there is nothing virtuous about it."

As if to prove Remo's point, the gunmen suddenly winked out of existence. So did the bullet holes in the walls.

"Let's keep moving," said Remo. "We gotta reach the thirteenth floor."

"Reach the thirteenth floor."

Friend sent the elevator shooting up from the ground floor. It stopped at the seventeenth floor, and the doors opened. There was no way to the thirteenth floor except by elevator. It was just a matter of time before the two human factors discovered this and came to him.

Therefore, it was prudent to dispose of them sooner than later. There was much to be accomplished, and distractions cost money.

The sound of the elevator door opening brought Remo and Chiun snapping into defensive crouches.

"I didn't call for that elevator," Remo muttered.

"Perhaps it is another illusion," suggested Chiun.

"Maybe this one is, too."

They went to the elevator and peered in. It was very large and paneled in red leather so that it looked like a confessional.

"It might not really be here," said Remo.

"What do you mean?"

"Maybe the door is open, but we're really looking down an empty elevator shaft. We step in, we drop straight to our deaths."

"How do we test it?"

"It only looks real. Let's see if it feels real." And Remo got down on one knee and reached out to touch the elevator floor.

"It feels solid."

Chiun followed suit.

"It is real."

"But is it safe?"

Chiun came to his feet, face uncertain. "Let us seek a stairwell."

They separated and found no stairwells.

"I guess we take the elevator," said Remo when they had rendezvoused.

Together they stepped aboard. Remo hit the button marked 13, and the doors slid together perfectly. The elevator started down.

A snapping sound came over their heads, and the elevator went into free-fall.

Harold Smith extended his ignition key with one hand, which trembled from nervous excitement but not fear. He had been in this game too long to feel fear for his personal safety.

When the keys were snatched from his fingers, he slipped the hunter green necktie from his open collar and took both ends in his bony hands.

While the carjacker turned in his seat to jam the key in the ignition, Harold Smith pounced.

He knew he had less than ten seconds to kill his opponent before the other's youthful strength was brought to bear against him.

The instant Remo's feet left the elevator floor, he understood the danger. The cable had snapped. They were dropping at terminal velocity.

Remo surrendered to the inertia! forces. The elevator was dropping out from under his feet, so he allowed his body to rise. Chiun was doing the same. Their hands grasped the roof hatch, ripped it down and with the seconds running out, they scrambled up to the elevator roof.

They leaped toward opposite walls, fingers taking hold of the enormous steel running guides.

The elevator hit bottom with the violently creaky boom of a Volkswagen Beetle seized by a high-speed car crusher. The shaft reverberated like a struck pipe, and loose pieces of the walls came down and banged off the crushed cage. The broken cable began uncoiling like a heavy, wet rope and when it struck the remains, it crushed it to a metal pancake.

"Let's try plan B," said Remo, looking down from his perch.