Let Slip the Pups of War: Spot and Smudge - Book Three

by Robert Udulutch

  Chapter 33

  “Okay Kels, tell me what we’re looking at,” Lindsay asked.

  Kelcy continued to rub the silky neck of a small collie while looking up at a monitor mounted on a swing arm. She and Lindsay were in the surgical area in the back of the clinic and the monitor showed the black and white radiograph she’d just taken of the dog on the table. The high tech x-ray system was equipped with automatic diagnosis but Lindsay had switched it off. She also switched off the auto-anatomical detection which would have labelled the bones and joint structures.

  “Well,” Kelcy said as she tapped a pen on her lips, “We’re looking at a palmar view of this little girl’s left forepaw, and I think this may explain her reluctance to put weight on it. If I’m reading this correctly, there is a fissure fracture on the fifth metacarpal right there, about a half CM above the base, and two CMs in length. Other than that I don’t see any ligament damage and minimal soft tissue swelling.”

  “What else?” Lindsay asked, folding her arms in front of her.

  Kelcy had learned the hard way that her senior vet tech mentor would often lead her down a diagnosis path when there may be nothing else to find. She could never tell if she had missed something or if Lindsay was just pushing her buttons. It was a pretty effective teaching method, and an infuriating way to keep the teen on her toes.

  “Considering her advanced age, I’m only seeing slight signs of osteopathy,” Kelcy said, “and no appreciable cartilaginous masses. To my untrained eye she appears to have a normal case of old dog arthritis, but nothing a little carprofen and some glucosomine wouldn’t relieve.” She looked up at her mentor with her big brown anxious eyes, waiting for the verdict.

  Lindsay smiled, and said, “Recommendations for treatment, doctor?”

  Trying to control her ear to ear grin Kelcy said, “I wouldn’t suggest surgical, or even external coaptation with pins or plates for treatment.” She looked at Lindsay for a sign she was on the right track, but she got no feedback so she pressed on, “Given her small size and the minimal fracture, and the owner indicating she isn’t overly active and seems quite happy to just lounge all day, I would say we go with a mason metasplint and six weeks of close observation and restricted activity. Recheck her in three weeks unless they notice increased discomfort?”

  Lindsay put her hand on the teen’s shoulder and said, “Well done, Kels. It took me five months to be able to read those charts correctly. Someone’s been studying dog’s paws. Talk me through the splint application process as we do it.”

  As they finished up with the collie’s paw Lindsay said, “Nice work. Go grab your stuff and I’ll put her to bed. We can call her family while I run you home.”

  Happy with herself, Kelcy bounced across the surgical area and headed for the front of the clinic.

  The automatic doors slid apart as she neared the hallway to the treatment rooms. The overhead lights came on and the doors closed behind her as she skipped down the hall to the lobby. The clinic was closed and the lobby was dark except for the small light above the outside doors.

  As she crossed behind the reception desk a man appeared at the front door and kicked the glass with his foot. He was wearing a suit and yelling for her to help him.

  He was holding a medium-sized, brown and gray long haired dog. The dog was limp in his arms.

  Chapter 34

  VB pulled Gloria back a few steps into the corner of the shop so they were out from under the pool of light. With his back to the rows of metal tool chests they weren’t totally in shadow, but a least he was out of the glare and could more easily see into the dark garage.

  Keeping the taller Gloria in front of him he leaned from side to side, scanning the rows of covered cars. His car was twenty running steps away but there were a hundred places to hide in the garage and he’d be exposed as soon as he left the shop area.

  “So what now, Semion?” he said.

  Gloria started to turn around and said, “Barton, I demand that you…”

  VB stopped her with a hard poke to the back of the head with the muzzle of his gun. He said, “With all due respect madam advisor, shut the fuck up. You have to know I’m just itching to blow your God damn brains out.”

  “What happens next is up to you,” Semion replied in his ear, “We just want to talk, and I’m afraid that chush you were feeding our mutual friend there is not going to be acceptable.”

  “Okay,” Barton said as he took his cell phone from his pocket, “And after that?”

  “After that you can go,” Semion said, “You won’t say a word to anyone, I am confident of that.”

  “I know I shouldn’t ask this but I can’t help myself. Why wouldn’t I talk after you let me stroll out of here?” VB said as he saw his phone had no signal.

  VB reached behind him and grabbed the small metal box Gloria had been holding when he pulled in. He hit the top button and the garage door started to quickly slide open. It went up half way and stopped.

  “Because, mister director,” Semion said cheerily, “It would be your word against hers. And her words get heard by your president. Also, I would gut your pretty wife while your two children watched. After then I would have that double doctoral partner of yours violated in very bad ways.”

  “You have a gift for motivation, Semion,” VB said, “Okay, I agree. What is it you want to know?”

  The FBI agent was confident of two things. There was no good way to get out of the garage, and Semion had no intentions of letting him leave alive.

  He thumbed the phone’s screen, selected his last call and hovered over the talk button below Comina’s number.

  VB pushed off from behind Gloria, and immediately saw a flash of something darting in front of his face. Whatever it was tinked off the metal cabinet near his head.

  As he raced across the checkerboard floor several more whistled past him, snapping as they hit the tool cases behind him.

  He ran flat out for the garage door. As he left the workshop the door started to roll down and a barrage of the flashes zipped around him. They seemed to come from everywhere, shooting out of the dark and whistling past his head to snap beside him on the concrete wall.

  As he neared the closing door he saw two tiny puffs of smoke in the dark directly in front of him.

  He recognized the mini tranq darts just before they hit him in the shoulder.

  VB yanked the trigger on his pistol, aiming at the source of the darts. He feigned a move for the gap below the garage door but straightened up again as he raced past it.

  As he fired and ran into the dark, two more darts hit him in the back and the neck.

  VB continued to run and fire as he felt the rush of narcotics shoot through his body. He thought it wouldn’t be the start of a bad high if he wasn’t currently fighting for his life.

  He passed the far side of the garage door and saw the shooter straight ahead of him. It was a huge man standing between two customized trucks.

  The man was holding his bloody thigh and aiming an assault rifle directly at VB. He could tell the man was wearing a bulletproof vest, and it barely covered his bulky chest.

  VB aimed for a spot on the man’s lower neck. He steadied his running and bent his knees to give him a stable shooting platform as he moved forward at a dead run and pulled the trigger.

  Chapter 35

  “I didn’t see it,” the man said loudly, puffing from the effort of jogging with the heavy coyote in his arms, “I heard it hit my bumper and felt the car bounce. Oh God it made a horrible noise.”

  The man trotted behind Kelcy as she led him through the dark lobby and down the treatment hallway. He was nervously rambling the whole way, “…road was pitch God damn black. It all happened so fast. I never go that way but was trying to avoid the main roads…”

  They moved through the sliding doors and into the large back room and he continued to suck in air and gush out words, “…told my wife to get those fucking headlights fixed. Just run to the store before it gets dark she said
. Fuck! God forbid we have a salad without fucking croutons. Please don’t die, I can’t handle any more fucking karma strikes against me this week. Fuck this thing’s heavy...”

  Kelcy swept back the plastic curtain and the man dumped the coyote on the surgical table as the lights came on automatically.

  Lindsay had heard the commotion and ran over from the kennel area.

  When Kelcy looked down at the snout of the bleeding wild dog she froze.

  “Oh no, please no,” the teen groaned softly.

  Chapter 36

  Before VB finished his finger pull a stream of small bullets smashed into his sternum, and then his cheek, and then his eye socket, and then his forehead. He was dead before he sprawled onto the concrete.

  Semion jogged from the far side of the garage carrying one of Harley’s customized assault rifles. As he came into the light he bellowed a stream of obscenities in Russian and then boomed, “What the fuck was that?!”

  He trotted past the garage door as the five Tzeng cousins moved quickly from their dark hiding places with their rifles. They all stood over the FBI Director’s bloody body.

  Red faced and drawing deep breaths, Semion’s big bodyguard limped slowly towards them from between a pair of customized trucks.

  Semion yelled at the man, “I don’t know if I could have been any clearer, I needed him alive you stupid fucking blyad!”

  The big bodyguard’s arm was bleeding badly and he was holding a flap of skin in place on his thigh. He pointed his rifle at the agent’s body and mumbled something in Russian.

  Semion pulled the trigger of his assault rifle as he lifted the barrel. The gun burped and spat fire as it drew a line from the huge man’s genitals to his chin. The bulletproof vest barely covered the man’s rib cage and everything below and above it was torn to shreds. As the spent shell casings tinkled away on the concrete floor the big man gurgled something before coughing blood and falling forward, hitting the floor next to the slain FBI agent with a wet thud.

  Katia joined her father and the circle of Tiandihui gang members standing around him. She had stopped to open the garage door and retrieve Barton’s cell phone.

  She held it out and said, “Smart bastard. He slid it under the garage door as he ran. It had been connected but I didn’t hear anyone on the line. It beeped before disconnecting so I assume he reached someone’s voicemail. It’s a Boston area code.”

  Semion looked at the phone, and at the FBI Director’s body. He looked back into the repair shop and saw Gloria sprawled on the checkerboard floor with two tranq darts in her chest and one in her neck. He looked disapprovingly at his daughter but Katia just shrugged.

  Semion said to her, “Idti bystreye, Go. Get to Pembury. Do it now.”

  Chapter 37

  Kelcy pulled over a trauma tray and straightened the coyote’s head and neck.

  “Kelcy,” Lindsay said firmly to the teen, “You need to stay clear of that dog’s muzzle. She’s in pain and likely to snap.”

  Kelcy ignored her and checked the dog’s airway with her fingers. She opened the coyote’s mouth and pulled the tongue forward.

  She stuck a stethoscope in her ears and pressed the round disc to the dog’s barely moving ribcage.

  The man watched Kelcy work as he rocked back and forth. He was still breathing heavily and he looked a little green. Alternating between staring at the coyote and his blood stained tie, he continued to mumble quietly to himself.

  Kelcy said to Lindsay, “Tension pneumothorax, her left lung’s collapsed. We need to decompress her and we need a bolus of colloids for shock.”

  “Yes, her lung is collapsed,” Lindsay said calmly as she carefully felt around the wild dog’s rear half, “And her pelvis is crushed. She’s hypovolemic, in shock, likely has splenic rupture, and I’ve got massive hemorrhaging back here.”

  Kelcy looked up at Lindsay. Tears filled her eyes and she said, “Lindsay, I can’t explain it but we need to save her. I’ll never ask you for a favor ever again, but we need to save her. We just need to, please.”

  “You know I would try if you asked me to, Kels,” Lindsay said, “Truly I would. I’d do anything in my power to save this poor girl for you, but she’s not going to make it. I’m so very sorry dear.”

  Kelcy sobbed and tears streamed down her cheeks. She leaned over the table and put an arm around the young hunter. She brought her face down to the coyote’s snout and said softly, “I’m sorry Piff.”

  The coyote’s eyes opened and she reached out a paw and touched Kelcy’s tear streaked face. The wild dog licked her wet cheek and they stared at each other.

  “Jesus Christ look at that,” the man groaned, running his fingers through his hair.

  Lindsay went to a cabinet and came back with a syringe filled with a small amount of blue liquid. She stood next to Kelcy and said, “She’s in pain.”

  “I know,” Kelcy said, nodding. She sniffled and wiped away the tears on her cheeks with her palms as she said, “I’ll do it.”

  She took the syringe and thumbed Piff’s forepaw for a vein. She stuck it in, and placed her free hand on Piff’s head as she pushed down the plunger.

  Lindsay reached out and covered Kelcy hand. They finished the injection together. “It’ll be quick,” she said as she took the syringe away.

  Kelcy cradled Piff’s head and pressed her face into the fur of the wild dog’s muzzle. She smiled at the hunter, and almost silently said, “Thanks for being my friend, little one. I’ll let your mom know what happened.”

  The wild dog licked her again, and a moment later she felt the coyote relax below her.

  Kelcy closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She said, “It’s okay girl, go on now. Run, run home as fast as you can.”

  Lindsay left her with the coyote and walked the man through the clinic to the lobby. Before the front doors slid closed he turned to Lindsay and asked, “How old is she?”

  “She’s fifteen,” Lindsay said.

  “Fuck me,” the man said, “I want her taking care of me if I ever get into an accident.”

  “Yeah,” Lindsay said, “She’s pretty special. Good night, and thanks for bringing her here.”

  The man nodded, and walked slowly back to his car.

  When Lindsay returned to the surgical table Marty was standing next to Kelcy with his arm on her shoulder. He nodded to Lindsay as she joined them.

  “You did the right thing, Kels,” Marty said, “But being right doesn’t make it any easier, does it? We’re proud of you.” He looked at the teen for a long moment, and then at his watch as he said to Lindsay, “Why don’t you get her home. I’ll take care of this poor thing.”

  Chapter 38

  “You’re a curious fucking kid, you know that?” Ayo said as he watched the valley below them through his dented and scratched binoculars, “You and Dada make enough kwachas in one morning to rent your little dirt patch for the next five years and you look like someone just sullied your pretty wife.”

  Fulfort stared at the bloody rhino horn stump and almost heaved again. He turned his ashen face away and shoved away the canteen his father offered him.

  As Fisho finished cutting away the hanging bits of meat from the horn they heard the low beating of helicopter blades approaching.

  “Here they come,” Ayo said, looking at his watch, “Forty-five minutes, that’s pretty fucking good. They’re some pretty motivated fuckers.”

  The three poachers hid under a thick tangle of bushes at the crest of a ridge overlooking the wide, lush valley.

  Fulfort and Fisho had never been this far south and the green hills looked very strange to them after living in the more arid savannahs of Zambia their entire lives.

  Ayo leaned against a fallen tree with his rifle while Fulfort and Fisho worked in the thicket behind him. Fisho continued to pick at the horn as he whispered for Fulfort to finish scraping the leopard hide.

  They had come across two of the most prized poached animals in their first three hours in South Afri
ca. Ayo had been ecstatic. He rubbed Fulfort’s head and called the young man his good luck charm. Ayo shot the animals, and forced Fisho and Fulfort to do the skinning and horn cutting. He barked orders for them to do it quickly while he stood on a nearby rise and listened for the park rangers.

  The men weren’t very neat in their work and the hide and horn had required a lot of cleaning up. Ayo’s elation turned to violent frustration when he’d seen what a mess the two had made.

  The helicopter thundered over the rise directly above them. The blades beat the air and shook the bushes of their hiding spot. Fulfort covered his ears and crouched into a ball as the helicopter continued down into the valley. It circled the river and landed on the far side, next to the red and black hump of the rhino.

  “Get back to work,” Ayo hissed as he snapped his fingers at them, “And be quick about it, we may need to move out.”

  Three armed men jumped from the helicopter and established a perimeter a few meters from the big carcass. A moment later two men and two huge brown dogs hopped out.

  “What the fuck?” Ayo said, “Well who do we have here?” He put down the binoculars and grabbed his rifle, bringing it up to his shoulder and looking through the scope.

  Fisho put the rhino horn in a canvas bag and motioned for Fulfort to keep working. He picked up Ayo’s binoculars and leaned on the log next to the scraggly man.

  “I don’t believe it,” Ayo said as he watched the two men examine the carcass and the large hole in the animal’s face.

  The two huge brown dogs with black faces roamed the area, circling the men and the park rangers. Fisho saw them stop and smell all three of the spots where his son had puked.

  Fisho asked, “Who are those men? They don’t look like regular rangers.”

  “No, they certainly aren’t, Dada,” Ayo said, “We have a celebrity guest joining our little hunt today. That’s none other than the top bwana himself, Theo Mufamadi.”