“Why not?” Smirnoff asked.

  “Because I’ll kick your skank ass!” Taylor shouted, thinking that Smirnoff was speaking to her. “Nobody talks to me like that!”

  “Whoa, stand down!” McCabe shouted as Smirnoff’s defenses came online.

  “Ladies! Ladies! I believe I can solve this,” Tyler said, smiling. “It just so happens that I’m also identifying as a swinger this month.”

  Though her clothes were challenging, this woman robot was fascinating to Tyler. He moved slightly toward her and his eyes moved up and down her body.

  Recognizing that the male had begun mating rituals, Smirnoff pulled him close and kissed him. Her lips did not move, but that made Tyler all the more excited.

  “She even kisses like a robot!” he said, giddy.

  “Android,” Smirnoff corrected.

  “What the hell, Ty? We’re married!” Taylor protested.

  “No, this month we’re casually dating each other, remember?” Tyler reminded her, smiling at Smirnoff. “In fact, I’m available until next Thursday.”

  Smirnoff’s attention remained on Taylor. Even though the woman had applied several layers of colored oils to her face, Smirnoff could detect her increased heart rate, which caused the blood vessels in her face to swell. The woman was no threat, but she had ensured that Smirnoff remained in self-defense routine.

  “Your facial camouflage cannot hide your intentions,” Smirnoff said.

  “You’re about to wear my boot,” Taylor said, grabbing Tyler by the jacket. “Let’s go!”

  “Hey,” Tyler said. “I was just tasting what it would be like to identify as a robot in a human-oppressive world!”

  “You’re supposed to wait until next month!” Taylor shouted.

  As the couple stormed off, Smirnoff catalogued the encounter and moved to the next store. For the next ten minutes, she continued her study of the humans occupying the mall. At one point, she had tried to guess the motivations of various shoppers, but could find no consistent pattern.

  “I have concluded that the majority of humans surrender control of their will to whichever store they are standing in.”

  “That’s pretty accurate,” Zelensky admitted. “I almost never leave with what I go in for.”

  “Okay, Smirnoff, that was a good field trip,” McCabe said. “Time to come home.”

  “Mission complete,” Smirnoff acknowledged, returning to the end of the mall she had entered.

  Outside the mall, Taylor and Tyler hid behind large bushes.

  “Why can’t you just let it go?” Tyler asked. “We’ll make fun of her on our next video!”

  “I’m going to settle this now! Didn’t you hear how she spoke to us?” Taylor whisper-screamed. “It was like we were beneath her or something.”

  “I don’t know what you expect to accomplish.”

  “I always get the last word,” Taylor said, peering through the foliage.

  That’s for sure, Tyler thought.

  They saw Smirnoff exit the mall. She slowly turned around three-hundred and sixty degrees, as if she was taking a panoramic photograph. Even though Taylor and Tyler remained still, Smirnoff walked directly toward them.

  “Your heat signatures betray you,” Smirnoff said.

  “I told you!” Tyler said, moving out from behind the bush. “If she’s identifying as a robot, she has all kinds of sensors and stuff!”

  “Smirnoff,” McCabe said. “Just tell them that you want to be left alone and return to base.”

  “I wish to be left alone,” Smirnoff said and walked toward the back of the parking lot. She detected the two humans following her, but they did not register as a threat.

  “Hey, you slut!” Taylor shouted. “Don’t ever walk away from me again and if you ever touch my man, I will kill you!”

  Tyler followed behind, trying to pull Taylor’s arm. “C’mon, let’s just go,” he said.

  Taylor pulled her boot off and threw it at Smirnoff. The boot struck the back of her head.

  Smirnoff turned toward her and returned to defense mode. “You are jealous. This is good. I am now able to interact with you on an emotional level.”

  “You can drop the whole fake robot routine!” Taylor shouted. “No one believes you!”

  Zelensky tried to get her attention. “Smirnoff? Hello?” and then turned to McCabe. “Uh, why is she broadcasting Alpha Waves?”

  “She’s being threatened,” McCabe said. Then his eyes widened as he looked at Smirnoff’s readout. “Uh oh. This is not good.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’ve never seen this code before,” McCabe said.

  “Call her back!” Zelensky shouted.

  “I can’t,” McCabe said and then looked at the code’s timestamp. “I’ve never seen this code before because she just wrote it.”

  The camera feed stopped as she entered warrior mode.

  “What just happened?” Zelensky asked. “Get her back online!”

  “I’m trying!” McCabe said, typing furiously. “She’s in full offensive mode!”

  McCabe pulled up Smirnoff’s schematic and then leaned back in his chair, throwing his hands up.

  “I’m locked out.”

  “I am curious,” Smirnoff said, leaning forward. “Why did ‘your man’ not resist my kiss?”

  Taylor lunged to grab a handful of Smirnoff’s hair, but Smirnoff grabbed her by the arm and began twisting. The snap of bones was concealed by Taylor’s wail of pain. As she tried to back away, Smirnoff’s left hand shot out, grabbing her by the throat.

  “Hey!” Tyler shouted.

  He squared his shoulders back, revealing a well-chiseled physique. The pose alone was normally enough to stop any fight, but Smirnoff ignored him. Tyler tried to pry Smirnoff’s hand from Taylor’s throat, but her fingers would not budge.

  “Let her go!” he shouted.

  Smirnoff turned to Tyler.

  “This unit is emotionally damaged,” Smirnoff explained. “She is of no further use to you.”

  Pistons in Smirnoff’s forearm flexed, crushing Taylor’s neck. Smirnoff dropped her body and Tyler stared at Taylor’s lifeless eyes. There was a momentary disconnect. One moment she had been her normal loud self and now she laid on the ground, quiet and unmoving.

  When the realization of what had just happened finally set in, rage inside Tyler boiled over. He slowly turned away and then, with a shout, charged.

  “Ah, an attempt at deception,” Smirnoff said, grabbing him by both wrists. “You have failed. If I let you go, would you like to attempt a different attack?”

  Tyler twisted in pain, trying to free himself from Smirnoff’s grip, but it was like trying to move a wall. “I’ll kill you!” he shouted.

  “That is the wrong answer,” Smirnoff replied, relieving Tyler of his arms.

  Smirnoff left the two bodies where they lay and mindlessly returned to base. She remained in warrior mode, broadcasting Alpha Waves.

  Chapter 15

  Chiun smiled as he sat on a throne mounted at the bow of an ancient Korean Turtle ship. The ship was hundreds of years old, but the cannons were fully operational and the iron plating that covered the top of the ship still boasted sharp metal spikes that prevented other ships from boarding it.

  Though the ancient battle ship had not been in use since before the Chosun Dynasty, its maintenance was listed at a priority above North Korea’s nuclear program. The ship creaked with the rise of each wave, forcing Stone to steady Mick’s wheelchair.

  “Good thing Mick’s still asleep or he’d be puking,” Stone said. “Is this your ship?”

  “This,” Chiun said, waving his hands around. “is Pog-pung, the vessel used by Korean kings to visit Sinanju.”

  “In other words, it’s your ship. Haircut back there sent us here in a helicopter, so why are we taking a boat?”

  “You will see,” Chiun said.

  Chiun would not reply to any of Stone’s other questions. For the next forty minutes, the ship tracked the western coast of Korea. Stone only saw mud, snow and small houses on the shore.

  “What is that smell?” he asked, crinkling his nose as an acrid odor drifted toward them.

  “Home,” Chiun replied, barely containing his glee. “Soon, you shall walk where the Great Wang himself once strode!”

  “I hope your food tastes better than it smells,” Stone said. It was way past lunch and he was getting hungry.

  “There are no hamburgers in Sinanju,” Chiun said, snorting. “It is time to awaken the scribe.”

  Stone barely saw the fingernail touch Mick’s neck before he heard coughing. Mick’s head bounced around, but his eyes were unfocused.

  “Mick, can you hear me?” Stone asked.

  “He is weak,” Chiun said, rising from the throne. He stood in front of Mick and slapped him on the left side of the head. Mick began sputtering.

  “Why did you do that?” he asked in a coarse whisper. “Where are we?”

  Chiun smiled but would not speak a word. As the ship rounded the bay, Chiun moved out of Mick’s line of sight.

  “We are home,” Chiun said, pulling a rope beside his throne. A loud, droning wail erupted from the head of the turtle mounted at the front of the ship.

  Stone covered his ears. “Hey, let a guy know the next time you want to do that!”

  The Horns of Welcome appeared in the distance and Mick’s face instantly changed from a look of annoyance and anger to one of deep reverence. The twin spires of stone stood atop a small hill overlooking a cold, gray beach. The Horns were as much a cultural icon to the Sinanju as the Statue of Liberty was to Americans.

  Stone stared at the Horns with disbelief. He had a momentary flash of the dream he had on the flight to Pyongyang and then it was gone.

  “The village…” Mick whispered. “Stone, we made it.”

  “This is familiar,” Stone said, trying to remember the dream.

  Mick crinkled his nose in disgust. “What’s that smell?”

  “Barbarians,” Chiun said, shaking his head.

  As the ship approached the shore, Mick could make out more details. The Horns had been carved from two small mountain tops that had once stood above the beach. A long, wooden deck stretched out from the sea to the beach, where it turned into a stone walkway that led to the top of the hill between the Horns.

  Just like Kojong described in the records, Mick thought.

  Stone lowered Mick’s wheelchair to the deck and Mick used what little strength he had to keep the thick blankets wrapped tightly around him. Stone turned to look at Chiun, who remained seated on the ship’s throne.

  “What’s wrong?” Stone asked.

  Chiun stared straight ahead.

  “We wait,” Chiun said.

  “Mick doesn’t need to be out in this wind,” Stone said.

  “We wait,” Chiun repeated.

  The turtle ship blocked most of the wind from Mick, but it was still so cold that Stone knelt next to Mick to generate heat.

  Chiun stared at a small wooden stand between the Horns. Someone should have already manned the position and greeted them. The boy was right; the scribe would not last long in this wind, but Chiun would not move before…

  A small figure appeared at the top of the hill and lit a torch on the stand. Then Chiun heard the sound he had been waiting for. The figure placed a long wooden tube to their lips and the hillside was filled with the sweet notes of a daegeum. It pierced through the wind, a melodic greeting to the Master.

  Chiun stood from the throne, hoping that more people would show up to greet him, but he knew better. In this weather, most would probably be huddled in their huts.

  “Let us go,” Chiun said, nodding toward the top of the hill.

  Stone pulled Mick backwards up the steps until they arrived to the top, between the Horns. Stone took a moment and glanced up at the Horns. They were roughly cut as if someone had…used an axe…a wave of déjà vu danced up and down his spine. He closed his eyes and centered.

  “Master Chiun, we were not expecting you this soon,” an apologetic feminine voice said from beneath the cloak. “The villagers are not yet prepared for your arrival.”

  “I had hoped our stay at Pyongyang would have provided enough time for preparations,” Chiun said wistfully. “We must lead this one to warmth.”

  Mick looked at the woman in the cloak. He could barely make out her features, but small wisps of dark hair blew out from under her hood. Her smile was warm.

  “I am Mick, caretaker for the Sinanju tribe,” Mick said.

  “I am Hyunsil, caretaker for the House of Sinanju,” she said, nodding. “This way.”

  Stone pushed Mick on a cold, muddy path that overlooked a small village. He followed Hyunsil through the village square, which was filled with dozens of men crowded around the center, huddling near fires. They laughed and shared stories with each other, cooking what smelled like rotten fish. They ignored Hyunsil, but when they saw Stone and Mick, their laughter turned into whispers. Then they saw Chiun.

  As one, they turned to bow, but the cold turned their bows into trembling nods.

  “All hail….the Master….” An elderly man began speaking. Chiun held his hand up and returned the bow. The men returned to their fires.

  “They’re gonna freeze if they don’t get inside,” Stone said and Chiun stopped.

  “Look around, son of Remo Williams. Do you think there are heating machines inside their huts?”

  “Well, no, I guess not.”

  “Then stop guessing and observe. They are preparing for tomorrow’s feast,” Chiun said. “Hyunsil, bring the scribe to the House.”

  Hyunsil bowed and took the wheelchair from Stone.

  “What am I supposed to do?” Stone asked.

  “Acquaint yourself with your people. You may sleep in the guest hut,” Chiun said, nodding toward a tiny shack near the bottom of the stone steps that led up the hill.

  Stone noticed that it was protected from the wind by what appeared to be a huge pile of trash. He sighed. It could not possibly smell worse than what they were cooking.

  Hyunsil, Mick and Chiun ascended the steps to a freakish house at the top of the hill. It was approaching dusk, but Stone could not wrap his mind around the architectural oddity. If Frankenstein was a house, he was looking at its ugly brother. Whoever designed it had to be high or crazy.

  Stone turned back to the villagers at the center of the square. The men stopped speaking as he entered their midst. Stone tried to speak to them in Korean.

  “My…foot is…named Stone,” he said.

  The men glanced at each other and then all of them began pointing at his feet.

  They must really like my shoes, Stone thought. Gathering confidence, he continued. “I want to…talk about my love of…green whales.”

  Stone’s smile must have been contagious because the men began laughing. One of the older men motioned for him to come closer.

  “You are the Master’s slave?” he asked.

  It took a moment for Stone to process what he said and his eyes shot open in offense. Then he realized that his understanding of Korean was basic at best. Maybe they meant ‘pupil.’ Stone nodded yes, and the men nodded in understanding.

  “Bring us some water, slave,” one of the men said.

  Stone clinched his teeth and shook his head. He wished he had paid more attention to Sunny Joe’s Korean classes.

  Chapter 16

  Alton Edwards was not a happy man. He had always believed that once he had nailed his dream job as a NASA supervisor that his outlook on work would improve. But in his first week on the job, he had to close nine departments and now, more than eighty scientists and engineers were looking for jobs. He reassured himself that it was not his fault.

  Every department had been given a list of changes needed to comply with the President’s new order and at least ninety days to comply, but every director he spoke with seemed to believe that the orders could not possibly be meant for them. They sincerely believed that their work was too important to stop. It was almost as if the President’s new order had isolated waste at NASA into one big ugly pile that swept itself out.

  Alton hated the fact that he was the broom.

  It was Friday, and the last shutdown on his list was the Wilkins Laboratory. At first, he was surprised to see that the lab was on his list of closures. His records showed that it had been closed down decades ago.

  He knocked on the door and waited. And waited. After a few minutes, Alton unlocked the door with the key he had been given. He entered, but the only light in the foyer hung above an empty desk at the center of the room. The only sounds of life were low frequency hums above him. Alton used the stairs in an effort to save electricity.

  The second floor was as dark and silent as the first, so he shuffled to the third floor. What he saw caused his mouth to involuntarily drop open. Lights were on in every room and music was blaring down the hall. The waste he was seeing instantly justified the loss of the department. How much had they been wasting over the past few months?

  When he entered the last room on the left, music from The Who was blaring over large speakers in the corner. McCabe was sitting at his desk wearing a pair of headphones, working at his computer. Zelensky was dancing with a woman who, by the way she was dressed, was clearly not on the payroll — at least not the government’s payroll. Alton coughed to get their attention, but the music was too loud.

  Why do they always make it so easy?

  McCabe was busy scanning through Smirnoff’s records, trying to find out what had caused her to snap. The news had already reported the violent death of the two people who had confronted her in the mall. McCabe did not recognize them, but they were supposedly a famous MeTube couple. It would not be long before police found an image of Smirnoff from the mall video. Though she had no record to trace, it would not be hard for street cameras to follow her walking back to their building.

  McCabe was startled when his headphones were pulled off his head. He jerked back and, seeing who it was, pressed the pause button. The music stopped and the smile melted from Zelensky’s face.