Chiun examined his pupil's face quizzically.
"Sometimes a grandparent is a better parent than the true parent," said Remo.
Chiun's eyes beamed. "You mean me?"
"No. I don't mean you."
"But I am the father you never knew. Who is more fit to raise your child? Now that you are Apprentice Reigning Master, destined to assume the throne of Sinanju if you so choose, perhaps I could ease into my long-deferred retirement and raise your foundling daughter before white ways fully smother her natural grace."
"Actually I was thinking of my father, Chiun," said Remo, rotating his freakishly thick wrists absently.
The Master of Sinanju became still. His thin shoulders fell.
"He, at least, is part Korean, as are you," he admitted.
Remo relaxed. He expected the old Korean to take violent offense.
"It's just a thought. First we gotta find her. Then I have to convince Jilda."
"Smith's oracles will show you the way."
"Yeah. Let's hope they come through this time." Remo laughed awkwardly. "For an orphan I suddenly have a lot of family ties."
"If you have family," said Chiun magnanimously, "then I have family. For your blood is the same color as mine."
And Remo smiled through his worry. After all these years, they had learned that much about each other at least.
Chapter 5
United Nations Secretary General Anwar Anwar-Sadat did not normally accept guests into his Beekman Place home in New York City.
Business was business, and he conducted his business on the thirty-eighth floor of the UN Secretariat Building. Not here among his prized collection of rare Egyptian sphinxes, which symbolized both the secretary general's native country and the prime directive of international diplomacy: keep your damn mouth shut.
But this particular envelope was marked Personal and mailed to his luxury apartments. It enclosed a cryptic black calling card: THE EXTINGUISHER IS COMING.
The follow-up call came the next day.
"Say hello to the answer to all your problems," a voice said.
The voice was definitely male, but had a youthful timbre. It sounded very confident, that voice. Almost cocksure.
"And your name?"
"Didn't you read the card?"
"It said that you are the Extinguisher. But I fail to understand. Are you selling a service? I do not have roaches."
"You have a flash point, the Extinguisher will extinguish it."
"I see," said Anwar Anwar-Sadat slowly, his mind racing. He had many flash points. All stemming from his four-year term as UN secretary general. He had a vision for the world under the United Nations. It was called One World, an idea that surfaced from time to time only to be shot down in ignominious flames by the unimaginative. Anwar Anwar-Sadat was determined that this idea not die when his term of office expired.
"How are you able to help me?" he purred.
"You called for a UN rapid-reaction force tasked to put out every brushfire war and conflict, right?"
"This has been stolen from me. The stubborn and narrow-minded NATO generals have siezed control of my blue helmets."
"That's because you're thinking out loud."
"I fail to follow."
"The US. Navy has a quick-reaction force called SEAL Team Six. But they're clandestine. No one knows who they are and where they go until the dirty work is done and Six is on the move to the next hot spot."
"Yes, I am familiar with this SEAL team called Six. But what has that to do with me? Or for that matter, you?"
"This-I'm your personal SEAL team. A multitasked army rolled into one guy. I have the know-how, the weapons and most of all, the sheer blind guts."
"You talk boldly for a man who conceals his name."
"Call me Blaize. Blaize Fury."
"I have never heard of you, Blaize Fury."
The voice became suddenly petulant. "You never heard of Blaize Fury, The Extinguisher? The scourge of terrorists the world over?"
"I am afraid I have not. You are obviously he."
"I," said the voice calling itself the Extinguisher, "snuffed your worst enemy."
"I possess many enemies. Who might this be?"
"Mahout Feroze Anin. He had a price on your head. Don't tell me he didn't. You put a price on his head during that UN action in Stomique. Anin got away, chased your peacekeepers out and that left your sorry butt hanging in the wind. He swore to wax you in revenge."
Anwar-Sadat gripped the receiver until his knuckles burned white against his dusky caramel skin. "He is dead?"
"Consider his cold corpse my credentials. Now can we meet?"
"How do I know you are not an emissary of Anin?"
"If I wanted to kill you, my business card would have blown up in your face," the voice of the Extinguisher said flatly.
Anwar-Sadat regarded the ominous ebony card. It was a preposterous claim, but the voice was so confident he found the card slipping from his unnerved fingers.
"Call me tomorrow. If Anin is reliably reported dead, we will meet. But only to thank you, you must understand."
"Signal received," said the voice of the Extinguisher. And he hung up.