He glanced around the citadel corridor, but it was empty. A long line of colonnaded arches made of mud brick stood lonely sentinel over the dust of centuries. The sounds of battle outside were muted, as if he were under water. He peered cautiously upward. There were about a hundred stairs, made of stone worn smooth as glass and concave in the centers from centuries of long-ago foot traffic. At the top of the stairs the outline of a square opening could be dimly seen; the stairway was a death trap, but there was no help for it, he decided. It was the only way up.

He began to climb the stairs carefully, as if walking on eggs. He kept the M-16 aimed up at the opening on top. As he glided upwards silently as a ghost, the roar of explosions outside began to grow louder. He was about halfway up when he heard the clicking sounds of something bouncing down the steps.

Two hand grenades!

There was no escape! He couldn’t duck or sidestep or outrun them. There was only one chance. The Scorpion leaped upwards to meet them; only a second or two left. He caught one in his bare right hand and hurled it up towards the opening at the top of the stair as he swept the second grenade sideways with his foot. Balance gone, he fell back against the fortress wall. He was tumbling back down the stairs when both grenades went off at once.

The grenade he had kicked exploded in mid-air well below him, the stairs partially shielding him from the razor-sharp fragments. His ears rang from the concussion and he couldn’t hear the screams from above.

The Scorpion clawed at the stone stairs to arrest his fall and scrambled crazily upward on all fours, pouring automatic fire into the opening.

He shot up through the opening like an exploding champagne cork, firing in mid-air in a wild blind arc. The bullets stitched across the middle of a wide-eyed Bedu officer holding a Colt. 45 and staring in terror at the three bleeding carcasses collapsed around the stair opening where the second grenade had blown. The Bedu tried to raise the pistol, but it clattered to the stone floor even before the Scorpion emptied the last M-16 rounds into him.

The Scorpion dropped the M-16 and grabbing the Colt, leaped at the wooden ladder in the corner leading to the top of the turret. As he grabbed the bottom rung, a dark face peered down at him from a narrow opening at the top of the ladder. The Scorpion fired and the man’s rifle fell with a clatter down to the turret floor. The dead Arab slumped across the narrow opening. The bullet had hit him in the forehead, making it look as if he had three eyes.