Einstein Dog (18 page)

“Yeah,” Bob heard himself agree. Dumb as he was, he knew better than to object to the assignment. If he refused, they would simply get somebody else to do it. Bob supposed they'd asked
him
because he'd been working with the SMART dogs all along, and because he was the only person left to do dirty work since his brother's demotion. Hindquist had relegated Charlie to parking lot patrol after the botched kidnap operation.

Having finished his instructions, Doctor Molar sat behind his desk like a plump Buddha, waiting for questions. To avoid suspicion Bob asked where he could bury the dogs once they'd been euthanized.

“Somewhere they won't be found,” Doctor Molar quipped. “I suppose the old gravel pit will do. The ground is easy to dig and it's out of the way. We'll have Charlie give you a hand.”

Bob cringed, stifling a yelp of protest. He'd just have to figure out a way to fool Charlie
and
Doctor Molar, despite their superior intelligence. “We'll do it after dark,” he said, playing for time. “Can't go burying corpses in broad daylight.”

Dr. Molar nodded in agreement.

“Tough break, man,” Charlie consoled breezily after Bob filled him in on the assignment. “You must be attached to the mutts, working with them and all.”

Bob nodded.

“Best get it over with quick, eh?” Charlie tapped the blowgun, which sat on the table between them. “Why don't you wait here? I'll do the job, then you can help pack 'em up for disposal.”

Bob shook his head. “I'll do it,” he said, slamming his hand down to prevent Charlie from picking up the blowgun.

“But I thought . . . ”

“I'll put them down!” Bob insisted.

“Whoa! Okay.” Charlie held up his hands in mock surrender. Since the SMART lab fiasco he couldn't afford to step out of line, not even with his upstart little brother.

“You get the van ready. I'll bring them out,” Bob ordered.

“It's your show, little bro,” Charlie sneered. “I just hope you know what you're doing.” He shoved back his chair and strode out of the room.

For a second doubts assailed Bob. Maybe he should let Charlie in on the plan . . .

“Don't be stupid,” he spat. Charlie wouldn't have anything to do with it. He'd rat to get back in Hindquist's good graces, and for the SMART dogs that would mean certain death.

Reluctantly, Bob picked up the blowgun. “No sense putting it off,” he grunted, hoisting himself out of his chair. He'd thought his plan through carefully. It might work; then again, it might not. Either way, the odds weren't going to be made any better by his sitting around, stewing over them.

He removed five darts from their holders on the blowgun and laid them out on a laboratory workbench. The dogs weighed in at twenty-five kilograms and he needed them out for about an hour. Too much serum and they wouldn't wake up in time; to little and they wouldn't stay down long enough. He wanted them to revive during the drive out to the gravel pit, but to look limp and dead when he loaded them up for transporting. He had to hope that when they
did
come to, they'd figure things out and not give themselves — and him — away.

They are SMART dogs, after all, he reminded himself, snapping the darts back into their holders.

He made his way through to the kennel briskly, like a man set on a grim mission. Doctor Molar and Hindquist might have been watching on AMOS TV, as the surveillance system was fondly known.

Breeze's cage came first. She regarded him uncertainly from behind her chain link fence. Bob shoved a dart into the blowgun and raised it to his lips. If Breeze remembered the weapon from the night of her abduction, she didn't show it. She watched, puzzled, as he aimed. Bob held his fire a second or two, pleading silently for her to forgive him, then he let fly.

Phtoo!

The dart zipped out of the gun, stinging her left shoulder. She yelped, giving him a hurt, betrayed look, then staggered back and sank to the floor, unconscious.

Cap and Blizzard couldn't see what was going on, but the zing of the dart and Breeze's yelp set them off. Their furious barks echoed through the kennel. His hands shaking, Bob reloaded and scuttled over to the front of Blizzard's cage. The dog retreated as far into his cubicle as he could, pacing nervously. Bob poked the blowgun through the fencing and aimed.

Phtoo!

The dart pierced Blizzard's right haunch, hanging there like barbed spear. Blizzard sat, wobbled, then lay down, giving in to the drug.

Cap snarled and lunged at the chain link fence when Bob positioned himself in front of the third cage.

Phtoo
!

The first dart glanced off the mesh and missed. Bob reloaded, then fired again, this time puncturing Cap's shoulder. Instead of sedating him, though, the injection goaded Cap into an even more violent attack, frothing and biting at the wire mesh.

Bob loaded a third dart into the chamber.

“Please!” he begged silently. “Go down!”

A second injection would almost certainly kill the dog, but Bob couldn't hold off or Hindquist would be suspicious. He inhaled, took aim . . . then paused. Cap's rage subsided suddenly. The dog fought against it, but the poison in his veins took hold, and like a drunk he stumbled, then passed out.

“Good work, Bob,” Hindquist's voice crackled through the intercom. “We didn't think you had it in you.”

“Thank you, sir!” Bob answered, putting as much bravado into his voice as he could muster and glancing up at the surveillance camera cockily.

He maneuvered the limp bodies into transport cages and onto a dolly. As he wheeled his sedated prisoners through the AMOS facility, Bob whistled nervously. So far so good. The odds were still against him, but at least he'd carried off the first part of his plan. Bob allowed himself a little smile of congratulation. For once he'd done the right thing and no matter what happened from here on in, they could never take that away from him.

“You seem kind of chipper,” Charlie observed, helping load the cages into the back of the van. He peered into each one to make sure the dogs had been properly euthanized. “To be honest, I thought you were too much of a chicken to carry out a hit, little bro. Guess I was wrong.”

Bob nodded and breathed a sigh of relief as they peeled off into the night.

Rapid movement. A radio blaring. Human voices. Cap recognized these fleeting impressions, but couldn't fit them together. Then the van shuddered over a pothole and with a start, he bolted upright. For the second time in his life, he found himself in the back of a speeding van piloted by the Gowler brothers. He shook himself, then froze, suddenly aware of how much noise he was making.

“What was that?” Charlie demanded.

“What?”

“I heard something back there. You better have used enough juice to kill those mongrels, Little Brother. It would be very messy if we had to finish the job out here.”

Cap couldn't make out all the words over the throb and rattle of the van, but the threatening tone came through loud and clear. Charlie Gowler hadn't lost his appetite for murder.

“I'll go check,” Bob said nervously. “I used enough tranquilizer to kill a horse, but I'll look, just in case. Maybe one of the darts didn't inject properly.”

Undoing his seatbelt, Bob made his way clumsily toward the back of the swaying van. He peered into the cages. “If any of you are awake, pretend you're not!” he whispered urgently.

Cap frowned. The human who had drugged them knew they were alive and was pleading with them to keep quiet so his brother wouldn't find out. It didn't make sense.

What do you make of that?
Breeze asked after Bob returned to the front of the van, where he assured Charlie everything was okay.

Breeze!
Cap beamed, overjoyed.

Still breathing,
she signaled.

Me too,
Blizzard joined in.

We're not dead!

Not yet,
Blizzard agreed.
But if that other one up there gets his way, we're gonna be pretty soon.

It's either him or us
, Cap growled.
You know who he is?

Yes,
they agreed.

For now let's play along. Where there's breath, there's hope.

We may get out of this yet.

They bounced along for some time, then the van slowed and veered right. The hum of pavement gave way to the crunch of gravel. “I don't know why we don't just throw 'em into a ditch and be done with it,” Charlie griped as the van stopped and the Gowler brothers shoved open the doors. “Who's gonna track down three dead dogs? No one, that's who.”

“Mr. Hindquist wants them buried,” Bob said.

“Yeah? Well, what Frank Hindquist don't know won't hurt him.”

“You start digging over there at the edge of the pit; I'll bring the cages over and join you,” Bob said.

“Getting pretty good at giving orders, aren't ya?” Charlie challenged.

The back doors swung open, admitting a rush of cool night air. Cap breathed in deeply and caught a glimpse outside through his cage. They were in a place where darkness had not been driven back by the glare of city lights.

Stars!
So many of them they merged into a spray of constellations. Not since their days at Triumph had he seen a night sky, and never had he witnessed one like this. Cap vowed that instant that if they escaped, he'd never allow himself to be captured again.

“Here,” Bob said, handing a shovel and pickaxe to Charlie, who lumbered off with the clanking tools.

As soon as his brother was out of earshot Bob turned to Cap and the others. “I don't know if you can understand what I'm saying,” he began, “but I'm hoping you're all awake now. I'm going to put the cages on the ground, then open them up. I want you to run. Just get the heck out of here. Please, you've all got to run for your lives.”

“Nice speech, Little Brother,” Charlie's voice mocked from out of the darkness.

Damn!
Cap swore.

Their benefactor froze like a deer in the headlights.

Open the gate!
Cap signaled, focusing every shred of will into a telly he beamed at Bob.

Bob couldn't move, though. He was paralyzed by Charlie's contemptuous gaze.

Panic churned Cap's gut, but he concentrated and tried again.
OPEN THE DAMN GATE!
he commanded.

“So tell me, Bob, have you sunk so low that your only friends these days are dead dogs?” Charlie laughed cruelly. “Think of the family name, bro. Talking to corpses would be bad enough, but dog corpses! Man, that's pathetic.”

As Charlie taunted, Bob deftly fiddled loose the latch to Cap's cage, then moved away. “Just saying goodbye,” he explained. “They were my friends, Charlie.”

“
Were
or
are
?”

“Huh?”

“Well, it's just that I've never heard of a dead dog running for its life,” Charlie scratched his head. “That's what you were telling these carcasses to do, wasn't it? Run for their lives?”

“Maybe they can hear me from wherever they are,” Bob said.

“Like you was talking to their spirits, you mean?”

As he mocked, Charlie sauntered up to Cap's cage, bending over to peer through the grill. Cap waited until the mean, pudgy face filled up the grate, waited until the hatred coiled up in his haunches screamed
Kill! Kill! Kill!
, then he exploded out of the plastic cage, a whirlwind of fangs and claws.

“Aieee!” Charlie screamed, stumbling and flailing at the demon that had latched onto him.

Cap clamped his jaws tight and tore at his enemy. He roared, thirsting for the taste of cursed blood.

Something hit him hard on the ribs, a punishing blow that knocked the wind out of him. And again. “Stop it!” Bob shouted, striking a third time with the shovel. Cap released his victim and backed away, his hackles raised. “Stop!” Bob shouted. “And you, Charlie, stay right there, or I swear, I'll clobber you with this thing!” He brandished the shovel in his brother's face.