Major Winston Yu is the antagonist in the story, a frail old man who suffers from a bone disease and is one of the most evil villains ever to haunt the pages of a book. Yu heads the snakehead and was responsible for forming the Scorpia organization of spies gone bad. Through Scorpia, he arranges to kill eight do-gooders who threaten the fortunes of rich people dependent on world crises to keep their bank accounts healthy. The plan is to steal Royal Blue, the most powerful non-nuclear bomb on the planet, and use it to cause a tsunami north of Australia. The point is to wipe out the eight people gathered on a nearby island for a conference in one fell swoop that appears to be a natural disaster. Rather than twisting a moustache and cackling, Yu takes this all in stride as a civilized British citizen. He does his cackling and twisting inside himself.
