Hell's Gate

by Dean R. Koontz

  Intrepid barked again.

  Salsbury did not stop to think that Intrepid only barked in situations of great strain. Other times, he snuffled. The dog came through the open door, watched Salsbury return to his work. After a moment, he shook his big head as if satisfied Salsbury was his master, padded along the side of the house. He looked into the orchard, then turned and faced the man with the pencils.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Salsbury saw the dog running toward him, thought nothing of it. But as he got closer, Salsbury realized that the mutt's playfulness could ruin his drawing. He brought up an arm to ward him off and was bowled from his step onto the grass as the dog hit him, still running top speed.

  The dog rolled past him, not making a sound, came onto his feet as Salsbury was shaking his head and reaching for his sketch pad. Before he realized what was happening, the dog charged again. This time, his teeth were bared. They were unnaturally, supernaturally long and sharp.

  “Intrepid!” he shouted.

  The dog leaped.

  Salsbury whirled sideways, out of his path, felt claws scrabble weakly at him as the beast went by.

  “Stop it!”

  But the dog came again.

  This time, the beast waited until the last moment to leap, then leapt to Salsbury's right so that the man whirled into him instead of out of his way. Salsbury felt teeth graze his shoulder. The dog's claws hooked in his shirt and the tops of his jeans, and it came around for another nip.

  He avoided the vicious bite with no room to spare, saw another one coming. He grabbed the animal's front paws and pried them off, threw it, kicking, into the hedges. The dog lay for a moment, as if groggy, then bounded to his feet and came between Salsbury and the porch door-the only escape route.

  “Intrepid!” he shouted again, trying to make the canine come to its senses.

  Then he saw its eyes.

  They were flat and blue.

  The eyes of another robot, not the eyes of his noble mutt A deadly imitation.

  Sometimes, just as the worst is transpiring, you think of how monumentally stupid you have been, of all the warning signals you have ignored, of all the things you should have seen and interpreted as leading inexorably to the disaster now at hand. Standing there facing the mechanical killer, Salsbury thought of a number of things that should have put him on his guard. Firstly, there had been no place in the cellar for a man-sized robot to hide when they had investigated it last night; but a dog killer was considerably smaller. Secondly, if the first robot had been able to broadcast reports through the barrier to the lizard-things, it certainly would have reported Intrepid as a nuisance. Preparing a killer in a familiar form, therefore, would have been a logical next step. Thirdly, if this was Intrepid, how had he gotten into the house without Lynda to open the back door for him? Fourthly, Intrepid never barked except when extremely excited. This robot had made a mistake in that line, and Victor had obliged it by overlooking the error. Five: he had left his vibratube upstairs, thinking he would not need it until the portal opened again at one-thirty. But he had ignored all the signals, the flashing obviousnesses. And there it was looking big mean and slighty mad.

  Salsbury crouched a dozen feet from it, watching it carefully for the first indications of an impending attack. At the same time, his mind riffled through all that it contained; through what he seemed to know almost innately, looking for some piece of combatant's lore that would serve him now. How did you cripple a dog? This was not a dog, but a robot; still, it was dog-form and might be at least partially vulnerable to the same things a real dog would be vulnerable to. But those were few. A dog was compact and fast, vicious in a fight. Even if Salsbury had had a gun, it would have been almost useless against a trained killer dog-or a machine built to look and fight like one-for there would be no time to aim. There was only one moment when a dog was open to defeat: when it was in the air, after it had leaped. There might not be time to fire a well-placed shot, or pull a knife and sink it home, but there was time to do one thing.

  He began thinking again of the data buried in his mind. Here was a plan for handling a killer dog, something only a commando ought to know. Another mystery. Who had programmed him to know this? Who had foreseen the dangers? He stopped thinking about that and concentrated on the dog machine.

  When the beast was in the air, coming at him, it would be relatively defenseless. Its teeth would be out of range, its claws useless while in flight. Its front paws would be tucked weakly back and would not spring forward and unsheath their claws until the last second before contact. If Salsbury moved quickly enough, reaching forward to intercept it, he could grab one of those paws, twist it as he fell, and throw the machine over his head as hard as he could manage. Its own momentum would ensure that it would fall fairly far off and that it would hit the ground with great impact. The least he could do was stun it badly and break a leg. If he were lucky, it would break its neck or snap its spine.

  Then there was no time for contemplation as it rushed him head on. Its claws scrabbled on a bare patch in the lawn-clickity-click-click-and it jumped.

  He grabbed a paw, closed his hand around it, twisted, fell and threw, certain that his timing could not be right, though his body seemed pleased with the maneuver. A second or two later, there was a solid thump as the robot mongrel smashed into the earth fifteen feet behind him.

  He came to his feet, turned. He could see that the thing had been damaged by his trick, but that the wounds were not anything like he hoped for. It got to its feet and staggered, as if its gyros had been disturbed, then gained its balance and seemed as sure-footed as before. Its artificial fur was badly rumpled and did not smooth itself as real fur would. But its neck was still distressingly intact. Its legs had not been damaged. Of course, Salsbury told himself, he should have expected steel bones, should have known they would not snap as easily as calcium ones.

  He looked to the door, decided it would be suicide to attempt to reach that. The moment he turned his back and ran, the dog machine would be on him, on his neck with those nightmarish, over-sized fangs. There would be a great deal of brilliant blood, searing white pain. Then his throat would be gone and his brain would die as the blood ceased pumping to it. Maybe thirty seconds altogether.

  He confronted the dog and waited for its next move, hoping his luck would hold out and that he would be able to get the machine with the same combat device he had just used.

  He thought the chances of that were slim.

  It recovered in short order and charged again, taking quick little steps, then a long, gliding leap that would put it squarely on his shoulders, its fangs buried to the hilt in his neck. Unlike robot men, Salsbury would bleed, bleed like hell. Despite his fantastic capacity for recovery, his fast rate of healing, he would die, for he could never mend as swiftly as the machine could tear him open.

  He went under it, repeated the throwing trick, tossed it behind him. Surprisingly, he had gained another few moments of life.

  This time, the robot required longer to get up, but it was back on its feet at the end of a minute, looking as deadly as ever. Those blue, shining eyes were much more sinister in that canine face than they had been in the man-form robots. They gave the thing the look of the demon, a werewolf, a hell-beast come to judge.

  Watching it, Victor was sure something must have broken. A tube or a circuit board; a snarling of wires; a fracturing of condensor, transistor-something. Anything.

  But nothing had.

  It came after him again.

  He repeated his single trick, sent it careening into the side of the porch steps where it bounced off the concrete and thumped onto the ground, shivering as if it could know the meaning of fear as thoroughly as man. When Salsbury got to his feet, the machine was already standing.

  The sun seemed terribly bright, murderous.

  Victor was breathing heavily, sweating like a stoker on a steam locomotive. He wiped the perspiration out of his eyes and clamped his teeth together. This could not keep up forever
. Despite his overdeveloped body and reserves of adrenalin, he was flesh and blood. The beast, however, was metal and plastic. It would not tire. Sooner or later- most likely sooner-it would get the better of him, simply because exhaustion would dull his senses and make him more vulnerable.

  When it charged this time, he noticed that its right front leg was slightly bent. It wobbled as it ran, though it still maintained an adequate, killing speed. Spirits brightened a little, Salsbury moved forward more anxiously and clutched (hat leg, twisted for all he was worth and threw his opponent. It landed like a snow plow dropped two miles from a supply plane without benefit of parachute. Victor fancied he felt the earth tremor. When it got up, the right leg was dangling, almost useless.

  Salsbury chuckled. When he heard what the chuckle sounded like, he bit down on his lower lip and cut the sound off. It had the touch of insanity that precedes total madness; the sharp and biting shrillness of a man pushed too near the edge.

  When the mechanical demon came this time, it did not leap. It darted in for his leg, moving as fast as it could only on three limbs. Before Victor realized it had changed battle tactics, it had sunk its teeth into his left calf and was beginning to back-pedal in order to rip his flesh. He swung his right foot, smashed it alongside the head. The thing's jaws opened long enough for him to pull his wounded leg free. Then he kicked hard again, sent the demon tumbling into the shrubs. The only trouble was that in doing this, he lost his own balance, fell backwards, and cracked his head against the concrete steps.

  Blackness swept in like a wave, and he had to keep running to avoid getting wet He was losing the race. He tried to concentrate on getting up before the machine returned to finish him off. He raised to a sitting position, got his hands under himself. By the hedges, the robot was back on its three good legs, calculating its next attack. Salsbury pushed into a stoop, lost his balance when someone dropped a mountain on his head. He fell backwards again, onto the grass.

  Groggily, he looked around for the robot.

  It was taking a few tentative steps in his direction.

  One Another.

  Closer

  The unconsciousness swirled through his head, less complete than it had been, a blackness tinted with hints of ruby and emerald now. He would not pass out, but neither would he get up in time to save himself.

  The dog machine crouched, took a tense step.

  Then he remembered that he was up against the porch steps and that the door was immediately behind him, a few feet up. If he could launch himself fast enough, he might reach the portal and roll through, slam it behind before the mechanical killer could reach him. He put his hands under himself to make a try, then realized he was too late.

  The killer was coming at him, fast.

  CHAPTER 11

  When the killer was halfway across the open space, closing swiftly on Salsbury, it seemed to jolt like a slipping motion picture film. It barked viciously, snarling and yelping enough for a pack of wolves. Victor wondered, briefly, why the thing was bothering to make a pretense of being flesh and blood when its mechanical nature was now so obvious. At first, of course, it had barked and panted and lolled its tongue to make him think it was real, not wire and plastic. But now A moment later, he discovered the snarling was coming from behind him, from Intrepid-the real Intrepid. The mutt launched himself past Salsbury, slammed into the robot, and went rolling across the lawn in a tangle of claws and teeth.

  Lynda screamed behind Salsbury, then was at his side.

  “Get the vibratube!” he shouted. “Hurry!”

  She was gone then, the porch door slamming behind her.

  He watched the dogs fight, the long-toothed, battery-powered demon and his own noble mongrel. Judging from the manner in which he attacked the mechanical beast, Intrepid seemed to think he was a super dog himself. He rode its back, snarling and digging into its neck with his teeth, raking its sides with his claws. The robot staggered under his weight, nipped at him over its shoulder but could not get in any good rips with its long teeth in such close-quarters combat.

  “Stay with it, boy!” Victor shouted, his voice a long, wheezing croak.

  The mechanical beast rolled, twisted, got away from Intrepid, then launched itself back at him, got its teeth into his shoulder and ripped with a fury only a machine could have contained; such violent aggressiveness would have burned out an organic brain. Even from where Salsbury sat, he could see the rich gleam of blood against the tan fur of Intrepid's shoulder. The mutt yelped a painful series of noises, but he did not give up the battle. He got his own teeth into the robot dog's neck, right where the jugular should be, and tore. He came away with a mouthful of fur and pink plastic jell that exposed wires and tubes beneath a clear plexiglass casing.

  But he drew no blood.

  It was hopeless. Intrepid must have sensed that too. But he went for the throat again, gnashing teeth on that transparent casing.

  Lynda seemed to be taking a damnably long time. He wondered if she remembered where the tube was; if she had to hunt, she might not find it in time. “Lynda!” Salsbury shouted, frantic now that his dog was losing. “Lynda, damnit!”

  The robot had torn Intrepid's shoulder into a raggedy mess. Now it changed its tactics, satisfied it had accomplished all that it could with the shoulder. It went for the base of the dog's throat, bit there. Intrepid squealed, pulled away, losing some fur and dribbling blood from his throat now. He staggered and went down on his hind legs, as if he were very weary, too tired to much care any longer.

  The robot circled him, bit him in the haunch.

  “You son-of-a-bitch!” Salsbury screamed. “Leave him alone!”

  The robot bit Intrepid on the haunch again, worried the flesh a moment before letting go.

  Intrepid made a half-hearted muttering growl deep in his throat, seemed as angry at his own weakness as he was at the enemy.

  “Lynda!” Where was she?

  Intrepid gagged sickeningly and made a few meaningless passes at his adversary, never once getting a score. The robot came around the front of him, again, went in for his shoulder. Intrepid managed to bite the robot's nose, a nip that would have stopped an ordinary dog. But this beast was not ordinary.

  Suddenly Lynda was next to him with the vibratube.

  “Can you see which one?” he asked.

  She nodded and aimed.

  The weapon hummed. The beam caught the mechanical in the rear, made its fur stand on end all over its body, as if each hair were an individual wire. The thing let go of Intrepid and looked around, turned toward them and began a rapid hobble on its three good legs. It had been sidetracked by the necessity to put Intrepid out of the action; it was now returning to its original mission: to kill Salsbury and Lynda too, no doubt.

  Halfway to them, it shuddered-the beam still played on it-and tried to turn around, instead, dropped to the ground again, its neck casing shattered. It was still. Dead and finished.

  But Intrepid was also still.

  Salsbury's head felt like a cracked egg with things leaking out of it, and there was a small though bearable fire in his calf where the robot had sunk its teeth. Ignoring both of these pains, he made his way to Intrepid and knelt beside him. The dog looked up at him with huge brown eyes, slightly dulled now, licked his lips with a pink and swollen tongue. He didn't even whine. Salsbury thought there was a point where stoic courage became foolishness.

  “Is there a veterinarian in town?” he asked Lynda.

  “Dr. Debert.”

  “Get the car started. We're taking him in as fast as you can drive the damn thing.”

  She ran off to get the keys and left him the job of getting Intrepid into the car. He looked the dog over. There was not much blood coming out of his throat, but there was a good deal seeping from his shoulder and one haunch that the robot had worried. Salsbury slid a hand under the mutt's hind end, trying to avoid touching the quivering, open wound. He nestled the other hand under the dog's shoulder where the wound was simply too large to avoid. His hand got st
icky with blood. The dog whined when Salsbury squeezed the shoulder together but made no move to avoid his master. Victor stood with him, somewhat unsteady, and carried him to the car. Lynda was waiting and opened the door for him. He climbed inside and held the mutt on his lap all the way into town. Intrepid made no move, and his eyes were heavy. The greatest reaction Salsbury got from him was in the form of a thank you: the dog licked his hand.

  Dr. Debert had a modern clinic on the east end of town. They took Intrepid into the waiting room, his blood dribbling on the white tile. The nurse at the reception desk came to her feet, sucking in her breath. “I'll get the doctor right away. He can drop what he's doing.”

  So he stood with the dog in his arms as if Intrepid were a child. He could feel his own heart thumping heavily, almost as heavily as Intrepid's. His eyes were unaccountably blurry, and he couldn't seem to clear them. He decided he must be crying a little. Just a little; for a god-damned dog.

  When Debert came out, he stopped, shocked at the extent of his patient's wounds, then came briskly forward. “What was it?”

  “Another dog,” Salsbury lied a bit “It attacked me, and Intrepid defended me.”

  “In here,” Debert said, leading the way back into his office.

  They followed through a book-lined study into a white room with white fixtures and a blue-covered operating table with special clamps and straps for animals. There was already a poodle on the table. It looked at them with a thin, pointed face that was more nasty than cute, barked in a high, brittle voice.

  “I'm afraid we'll have to take Poochy into the waiting room, Mrs. Wallace,” Debert said to a matronly woman in an expensive, blue-knit suit with a line of yellow alligators stitched across her left breast.

  “But Poochy has glass in his foot!” she said, wrinkling her doughy face in consternation.

  “This dog may be dying,” Debert said, straining to remain polite.