Whoever this stranger was, he was dangerous. And he was coming their way.
Remo had quelled his initial anger at being detected.
He wasn't upset so much because he had lost the element of surprise, though that was cause for concern. A Sinanju assassin was never caught by surprise. No, Remo was angry at himself for allowing the camera to spot him in the first place. Something that amateurish wasn't supposed to happen.
Chiun would have been livid had he known. But Remo doubted if even the Master of Sinanju could have avoided the pair of surveillance cameras that had been suddenly trained on him.
Remo was sensitive to all electronic equipment and especially so to the many high-tech devices commonly used by security forces to detect enemies. In this case the cameras that had found him had been inactive when he first stepped into their range of vision. In this state, they were about as threatening to Remo as empty coffee cans. For this reason he had failed to note them. When they suddenly whirred to life, it was too late to move. It was almost as if they had known the precise moment he would be standing in front of them.
The cameras had been set up several yards apart on the same side of the path and were arranged so that even if one missed his movements, the other would catch him.
They couldn't possibly have known he was coming again, Remo thought.
Remo kicked the remnants of the nearest camera deep into the woods. The other camera, though
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smashed, still hummed quietly beneath the body of the Truth Church patrol leader.
Remo considered his situation.
The worst that had happened was that he had lost the element of surprise. No big deal. With all of the Ragnarok guards crawling through the underbrush, that probably would have been inevitable before he had reached the ranch.
So what if Esther Clear-Seer knew he was coming? It would give her time to make her peace with the Devil before he sent her off to her final reward.
Remo glided down the path toward the Truth Church encampment, every sense keyed up to maximum alertness. No one was going to catch him unawares again.
"Did you pick up the signal, Prophetess?" Raccoon Eyes asked anxiously.
"Yes, we did." Over the speakerphone Esther Clear-Seer's voice vibrated like a bass violin string. "Are the rest of the cameras ready?"
"They are," he replied.
"Do a systems double-check. Make sure we get those pictures back here."
"Yes, ma'am," he said. "And Yogi Mom?" he added, timidly.
"What is it?"
"Is this an agent of the Old Evil One?"
Her reply hissed angrily over the line. "Don't bother me with that crap now. I'm trying to save my ass."
With that she severed the connection.
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The others glanced at Raccoon Eyes during the awkward silence that ensued.
"The intruder must be in league with the Antichrist," he said with a solemn grimace.
The others nodded, and returned to their stations.
Buffy's eyes hadn't strayed far from her own monitors. Only the two screens were out, and she watched the others in concern as the ghostly images of Truth Church patrols trekked back toward the ranch. Esther must have given the recall command over their radio headsets.
The intruder didn't appear on any of her monitors, but Buffy assumed he was heading toward the ranch, as well. The acolytes were closing in behind him, sealing off his escape route like so much living caulk.
She chewed her lip nervously as she watched for the mysterious man to reappear on her monitor screens.
Beside her, Raccoon Eyes turned his attention to the digital clock mounted at his monitor station.
The toggle switches to the two dormant cameras, as well as a third scarlet switch, sat enticingly within his reach.
Remo paused at the edge of the forest.
The patrols were concentrating in the woods behind him. Nothing stood between him and the Ranch Rag-narok perimeter fence except one hundred yards of Wyoming greasewood prairie.
From high atop the nearest guard tower, halogen flood lamps raked the barren ground. While the beams played back and forth along the forest's edge with earnest diligence, they never quite managed to pin Remo.
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He spotted four other towers, two to the south, the other due west. The lights from these moved relentlessly back and forth, as if searching for someone. For him, Remo understood.
He felt more than heard the hum from the electrified fence and Remo decided that he had better think of an alternate route into the compound. While a defense of this nature wasn't generally a major obstacle, he was in an unusual position. Those inside were alerted to his presence and he couldn't afford the few vulnerable seconds he would have to spend working on the electrified metal.
Remo waited until the spotlight beams broke at their farthest point in opposite directions before he emerged from the protective concealment of the forest. He slipped quickly across the small expanse of prairie to the nearest guard tower.
The tower exterior was rough and chalky. The structure had been built out of cinder blocks skimmed over with several coats of concrete to eliminate any hand-or toeholds between the heavy bricks.
Remo pressed his palms flat against the concrete surface and flexed his fingers. His loafers left the dry earth as he established a kind of suction and repeated the motion with his hands, pushing both inward and upward simultaneously. Spiderlike, he began ascending the tower.
There was a nest of razor wire encircling the concrete silo some three feet below the railed upper platform. Remo paused for a second, letting the pressure of his right hand and toes hold him in place. He snaked out his free hand and took a pinch of wire between thumb and middle finger, making a snapping motion.
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With a tiny pop, the wire sprang apart, falling limply in two neat sections.
Remo moved up between the dangling wires and oozed over the tower rail like so much black smoke.
He was met by the startled eyes of four Truth Church acolytes. Two were operating the spotlights, and the other pair had been peering out toward the woods where the first Ragnarok patrols had already begun moving in a parody of stealth from out of the forest.
The two guards on lookout duty hastily trained their rifles on Remo. Unfortunately for them, Remo had positioned himself in such a way that the guards found themselves standing on either side of their target, so that to open fire each guard would be forced to mow down the other.
Sure enough, that gave them pause.
While they were puzzling over how to proceed, Remo snatched a rifle barrel in each hand and, with a quick, jerking movement, crossed his forearms. Each man lurched forward. The force Remo exerted was enough to drive the business end of each extended rifle into the face of the man opposite.