Remo The Adventure Begins by Warren Murphy Page A

Chiun jump up two feet and land on something hard, hard as concrete. Remo jumped two feet and landed next to Chiun. Chiun moved forward and then jumped horizontally fifteen feet across this concrete floor. Remo stepped, breathed, jumped and landed fifteen feet forward. He could never jump fifteen feet in high school but this wasn’t just jumping. This was letting the body move where the mind wished. The body knew so much more about itself than the person did. It all came through the breathing. That which should have been alive all the time was alive now. And it was simple.
    Yet there was a strange feeling as he spanned those fifteen feet; it was as though the concrete had become exceedingly light, very thin, like clouds beneath him. He opened his eyes to find the reason behind that odd lightness, and when he did, he gasped.
    “Holy shit,” screamed Remo. He was looking down forty stories from the concrete railing of a roof. He had been jumping from one building to another with his eyes closed. He felt his legs give way and, terrified, he reached in toward the dark surface of the rooftop behind him. He fell to it, trembling.
    “What is your problem?” asked Chiun. “If that railing were on the ground you would strut across it like a peacock.”
    “That’s forty stories down. It’s not on the damned ground. It was never on the damned ground. You had me jump from one building to another with my eyes shut.”
    “Why are you afraid? Do you want to fall?”
    “That is a dumb question,” said Remo. The tar on the roof was sticky. That apparently was the softness he felt beneath his feet on the roof he had left before he jumped to the concrete railing. He stood up.
    “Answer the question,” said Chiun.
    “No. I don’t want to fall, of course.”
    “You fall because you are afraid. Fear is nothing more than a feeling. Do not give it more due than it deserves. You feel hot. You feel hungry. You feel angry. You feel afraid. Fear can never kill you. So what are you afraid of?”
    “Falling forty stories.”
    “If you fill your mind with fear, you cannot fill it with the powers you have. And to do that you must breathe. Allow yourself to fall and you will not fall. Up. Come,” said Chiun, and beckoned Remo to the railing.
    Remo forced himself up on the rail and avoided looking at the streets below.
    “Do not tell yourself the fall is not there because your body knows it is a lie. Your body is becoming Sinanju through your mind. Come. It is easy,” said Chiun, and backing away in the dark robes he seemed to glide backward across the other building. “But remember, do not jump. Move. Believe. You are the power of yourself. You are one.”
    Remo took a few steps back to get up a running start until he saw Chiun’s hand raise to stop him.
    “I said, do not jump. I said move. Move your body. Move with your body. Look, beyond there over the ocean, dawn arises. That is your sun. You are becoming the sun source. See the sun. Run to the sun. I will never let you fall, neither will the sun or the universe.”
    Remo moved. His legs sank his body into the concrete railing, feeling it, knowing it, being one with it in the cool dawn, and he sensed the world, he tasted it on his tongue and on his whole being. The sun was rising before him, and his body was moving. When he landed he saw he was on the far side of the Master of Sinanju. He had jumped past Chiun, across the narrow alley between the buildings and over Chiun. He didn’t even dare calculate how many feet it was, but it certainly would have been some sort of record, if he bothered to record it.
    He smiled at Chiun. He had done it.
    “Your elbows,” said Chiun. “They were too wide.”
    “I would have set an Olympic record if someone were judging me.”
    “I was judging you. You failed,” said Chiun.
    “I’m not dead. I didn’t fall. I jumped I don’t know how many feet. Did you see what I did?”
    “Most certainly. You let your elbows fly. I teach. And I