Dogs of S.T.E.A.M.

by Ralph E. Vaughan

  Levi replied: “‘Anubis, guide of the dead, conducts spirits of dogs safely down the dank ways, where shadows gibber like bats, past the deadly streams and the Gate of Darkness and the realm of bad dreams, across the Bridge and into the Green Meadows where the Sun ever shines’.”

  “That’s it,” Yoda confirmed. “I may not know much about the Cerberus myth, but is he not the terror at the Gate of Darkness? And does he not devour dogs?”

  “He is,” Levi affirmed. “He does.”

  “Are you saying this phantom dog is Cerberus?” Sunny asked.

  “No, but the eyes are strange,” Levi mused. “We think of him as having three heads, but that’s thanks to the Romans. Originally, he had one head, but with six eyes.” Before the others could protest, Levi continued: “All the dogs reported seeing three eyes on each side of his head, but only one set of eyes ever glowed. Despite all appearances, our giant hound has only one set of eyes, just like any other dog.”

  “And the other eyes?” Groucho asked.

  “Merely markings that look like eyes,” Levi answered. “For all his great size and menace he’s just an ordinary dog.”

  “An ordinary dog with a snake for a tail,” Sunny pointed out.

  “We’ve all seen dogs with odd tails, or no tail at all,” Levi said. “No matter how it has adapted, a tail by another name still wags.”

  “An ordinary dog who vanishes?” Yoda asked. “Like mist?”

  “We have received many reports of vanishing animals, as well as objects and buildings,” Levi said. “Though we do not yet know the reasons behind the events, the very fact that they occurred tell us there is an explanation. We just have to find it.”

  Suddenly, the printer in the living room clattered, startling all, but also bringing a measure of relief. Sunny, Yoda and the three cats welcomed the interruption, as it distracted Levi from what might have been a very long lecture. They loved their alpha, but when he got going on a subject, particularly one that was obscure and intricate, he could go on forever, or so it seemed to those trapped in a room where all the air was being slowly sucked out.

  Levi, also, welcomed the break, for, unlike many, he was well aware of his faults. While there were aspects of his nature over which he had taken control, such as not becoming a heartless killer due to his nightmarish upbringing, he struggled with other traits, such as the need to pontificate.

  Little Kitty bounded into the room just as the printer spat out the second and last sheet of paper. She leapt to the top of the couch, landing too close to Kim because she had not seen her, nearly missing anyway through misjudgment of the edge. Through long practice she recovered nicely.

  “Sorry, Kim, I didn’t realize you were in my place,” Little Kitty said as used her back right leg to flip her rear the rest of the way on the couch-top.

  Kim quickly scrambled out of the dimwit Calico’s way, arching her back. “This isn’t your…”

  “What do you have for us, Little Kitty?” Levi asked, tilting his head imploringly at the older cat.

  Kim harrumphed in irritation, but lowered her back and moved aside. Before turning her attention back to the meeting, she gave the much younger Calico a good dose of stinkeye.

  “What did I…” Little Kitty started to say.

  “The print-outs, Little Kitty,” Levi reminded her.

  “Oh, I finished putting in all the data that Grandma…”

  “I am not your…”

  Levi barked peremptorily.

  Little Kitty looked around. “Oh, hi, Groucho, what are…”

  “Little Kitty!” Levi snapped.

  The Calico sighed, rolled her eyes, and slumped to her belly. She had no idea why everyone was picking on her today.

  “I plotted all the information I was given on a map of Chula Vista,” Little Kitty said, her tone being that of one who always had the weight of the world upon her shoulders. “Since the source of the sound seemed somewhere to the south, I put our neighborhood to the north. If you’ll look at the map…”

  Sunny, the tallest of the dogs, had already taken the two pages from the printer and placed them on the floor. Levi pushed the edges together to form a single map. Dogs and cats gathered around, except Little Kitty, who stayed atop the couch wallowing in misery.

  “The lines seem to converge in the far south, somewhere in the vicinity of Otay,” Levi observed.

  “So, the road leads to Otay?” Yoda said.

  “Where in Otay?” Sunny asked.

  “Hard to say without a third sighting,” Levi replied. “We have several reports but they give us only two sighting lines. With what we have here, we only know it’s south of Orange Avenue and north of the Otay River.”

  “River indeed!” Yoda snorted. “It’s barely a trickle.”

  “To pinpoint the source,” Levi continued, “we need a third line of sight from a totally different direction.”

  “As we might get from South San Diego?” Sunny suggested.

  “If we are lucky,” Levi acknowledged. “We’ll take this map, see if we can get another line from interviewing Sammy and Kelsey. We might be able to triangulate the source with some precision.”

  “It will take us several hours, even at best speed,” Smokey observed. “It will be after dark. Very bad.”

  “No, I want you and Groucho to head down to Otay,” Levi said.

  “I can help protect Yoda and Sunny,” the cat insisted.

  The Golden Retriever and Pomeranian started to protest, but Levi cut them off.

  “We should be sufficient to any threats that arise,” Levi said.

  He had taught Yoda and Sunny a few of the fighting techniques he had picked up in his early years as a bait dog. Not the worst of the moves he had learned, of course, or the ones that were forbidden because they often resulted in death, but techniques sure to be unfamiliar to any foes they might encounter.

  “Very well then,” Smokey agreed. He knew he could not argue against a knowledge of fighting skills greater than even his own. “Groucho and I will go to Otay and nose around, see what we can pick up from strays and clowders operating there.”

  “I will, however, need to know the exact directions you got from the hobo cat,” Levi added, to which Smokey nodded.

  “What do you want me to do?” Kim asked.

  “I you to continue interviewing informants as they come by,” Levi instructed. “Now that we know this is much more than just a sound in the night, try to find out more about apparitions.”

  “Like flying dogs,” Little Kitty murmured. “Or maybe dogs who are flying.”

  “As you gather information, pass it to Little Kitty,” Levi said. “I want a plot of where the phantoms were seen, especially that big dog. It might give us more insight into the mystery if we can see if there is a pattern of some sort.”

  “Stark barking mad,” Little Kitty muttered.

  “I’ll do my best.” Kim frowned at the Calico. “And so will Little Kitty.”

  The much-abused Calico sighed.

  Without transportation, there was no good way to get to South San Diego. The most direct route was along I-5, but was out of the question; as a species, canines were wary of even the most sparsely traveled streets, amounting to a form of kinessiphobia, so walking alongside an interstate passage was out of the question.

  A second way into the dangerous south was to follow the tracks of the San Diego Trolley, but it, too, was laden with peril, not the least being the trains themselves and the gang-haunted wastelands through which they ran. Also, there were multiple road crossings in which the cars were more perilous than the hurtling trains since the sound of a warning bell or the sight of a descending barrier-arm was a signal for drivers to jam down accelerators and race against their own mortality. In the end, they decided to journey along the bay front until they reached a point where they could follow the directions the hobo cat had given Smokey.

  They headed west on F Street, passing the rows of dilapidated apartment houses beyond Broadway, t
heir progress keenly observed by dozens of apartment-bound pets. They entered the marshlands past the railroad crossing. Just before reaching Gunpowder Point, the site of so much conflict and pain, hope and redemption only a short time ago, they followed the curve of the road into Chula Vista’s waterfront district. They passed between warehouses and shops to the east and a forest of slender masts to the west, yachts and other craft that called Chula Vista their homeport.

  It was a roundabout route, following the curve of the bay, but there were few cars and fewer inhabitants. Between wilderness and industrialization, they saw almost no Companions. What few dogs they saw were sly and furtive solitaries who kept their distance, and their own company. At any other time, the three dogs might have attempted contact to bring them more into canine society, but they were on a mission and could not afford the delay.

  They passed the ruins of the electrical substation, demolished, then left to the elements. When they sighted the dazzling white hills of the Western Salt Company they put their weariness behind them, for they were more than halfway to their goal.

  When they reached the tiny community of Nestor, fatigued and paw-sore, the sun was vanishing in the west, but they were now at a point where they could follow the tracks of the hobo cat. Putting the steep rise of Suicide Hill at their backs, they crossed over the bright lights of the interstate and entered the dangerous world of South San Diego by night.

  Chapter 5: The Darkness Beyond the Purple Cow

  Present Day

  South San Diego, Calif.

  Earth 1

  “Welcome to Spooksville,” Yoda murmured.

  “Don’t let your imagination run away with you, Yoda,” Sunny advised. “It may look gloomy by night, but during the day I’m sure it looks like any other neighborhood.”

  “Yeah,” Yoda agreed. “Like any other neighborhood…where death waits around every corner.”

  “There’s the service station with one letter dark in its sign,” Levi observed, inserting an extra measure of calmness into his tone. He knew emotions of pack members could be affected by the tenor of a pack’s alpha. “Around the corner, we should see the sign of the Circle-K, then a Purple Cow.”

  “Purple Cow,” Yoda chuckled, his anxiety dissipating.

  “Sounds funny,” Sunny agreed, “but hobo cats are never wrong about route markers.”

  They scampered through the darkness at the rear of the filling station to avoid the bright lights and traffic at the corner. Emerging on the dimly lit intersecting street called Hollister, they saw the tall sign of the Circle-K convenience store. They looked down the street on the opposite side.

  “A purple cow,” Yoda murmured. “How ‘bout that?”

  “Told you,” Sunny said. “Hobo cats may be odd in many ways, but they never make mistakes about the journey.”

  The statue in front of the Purple Cow Dairy was a cartoonish cow with a goofy look on its face and outsized udders beneath. The sculptor had caught the cow in the midst of a jaunty prance, hooves raised and canted to one side. Reflecting the bright flickering neon lights overhead, its plastic hide was a vivid purple with splashes of brilliant white.

  “Does it give purple milk, you think?” Sunny asked, grinning.

  “Sure it does,” Yoda quipped. “Just like the how-now-brown-cow gives chocolate milk.”

  “Keep aware of your surroundings,” Levi advised. “Don’t let yourselves get distracted.”

  Beyond the Circle-K was a murkiness unrelieved by the light of the dairy outlet across the street. A dim streetlamp revealed a boulevard stop, the bottom corner of the nearest sign dented.

  “Left at the hurt stop sign,” Levi murmured, recalling the directions Smokey received from the hobo cat. “Beware the running blackness where links part, and watch the walkway above as you thread rising white bricks. Pass between two glowing balls to enter the realm of the Gnome. The seventh apron leads to the portal of the China Dogs out of time.”

  Yoda sighed. “Cats are nuts…”

  “Don’t let Kim hear you say that,” Sunny warned.

  “…but hobo cats seem in a league of their own,” Yoda finished.

  “Hobo cats are quite eccentric, even by feline standards,” Levi admitted. “But, as Sunny said, they’re never wrong about markers.”

  “I’ll give him a pass on the Purple Cow because, well…” He gestured at the goofy statue in front of the outlet store. “But, really, running blackness, glowing balls, aprons?” He snorted in frustration. “And who is the Gnome?”

  “Hobo-cat markers often do not make sense, until you see them on an actual journey,” Levi said. “Then they become obvious.”

  Levi was no less dubious than his pack-mates, but he had dealt with hobo cats often enough to trust their ways, even if he did not always understand them.

  At the sign, they found themselves on a dark street barely wide enough for two cars. The sidewalk was broken and uneven. Weeds grew through cracks, brushing against the sides of the dogs.

  “Even the worst parts of Chula Vista don’t get…” Yoda started to say.

  “Listen,” Levi said softy. “Do you hear it?”

  Yoda and Sunny froze, straining their ears. They pushed away the distant sounds of traffic and the dull murmur of the interstate now east of them. What remained was a cottony silence that was not quite silent. Yoda then heard what he, rather than Levi, should have heard in the first place, a constant gurgling noise ahead and off to the left. He saw only darkness, and even Sunny, with the keenest vision of the three, could not penetrate the night.

  “Water,” Yoda said after a moment. “Water running through the blackness.”

  Levi moved off the walkway to the edge of the road, the others following. As they drew even with the source of the sound, they saw the metal of a chain-link fence glinting under faint starlight. The links had been severed from top to bottom and now the fence lolled open to both sides, more than wide enough to accommodate the passage of any large predatory animal. Yoda started to say something, but Levi made a subtle sign for silence.

  They did not hear anything but the sound of water running in a culvert that continued under the road. They did not see anything in the absolute darkness beyond the severed fence. And yet all three dogs sensed a malevolent presence concealed in the ravine, hidden among the thick brush and impenetrable forest of bamboo canes, something that lurked out of sight and waited for the unwary to pass. Once they were out of reach of the unknown night-hunter, Levi shifted them back to the broken sidewalk.

  “That made my hair stand on end,” Yoda breathed.

  “Oh, was that what it was?” Sunny murmured. “I thought you were trying to scare whatever-it-was by imitating a porcupine.”

  Yoda frowned, not used to being on the receiving end of a quip.

  “Rising white bricks,” Levi said, motioning ahead.

  A seven-foot-high wall of white bricks rose on the left. Beyond the wall was an apartment complex. Overgrown brush to the right of the sidewalk forced pedestrians to walk very near the wall. The top of the wall was nearly as wide as the walkway.

  “I’ll lead and watch the way ahead,” Levi said. “Yoda, you take second and keep your ears open. Sunny, you bring up the rear and watch for trouble from above. No less than two lengths between us, no more than three. I’m going to set a fast pace, but if either of you see or hear something, give an alarm-growl and I’ll give us a burst of speed, so don’t be caught unawares. Everyone clear?”

  They nodded.

  Levi started out at a quick trot. After a moment Yoda took after him, then Sunny. It was a speed they could maintain for perhaps an hour without difficulty, though it was hardly Levi’s best speed. If trouble struck from above, Levi would triple their speed. Though he was capable of even greater velocities than that, he knew he dare not run faster than Yoda or Sunny. If their small pack could be said to have a motto that defined their relationship, it was ‘no dog left behind…ever.’

  Trotting briskly, Yoda swiveled his
head slowly back and forth, as if his ears were indeed radar dishes. It was a comment often made behind his back, but rarely out of his hearing.

  Sunny used her height to great advantage, sweeping her gaze along the flat top of the wall. Like Yoda, she had doubted the hobo cat’s reliability, but their passage by the lurker in the ravine had made her a believer.

  In the lead, Levi concentrated on the path ahead and on keeping a pace the others could hold to. He had complete trust in Yoda’s ears and Sunny’s eyes. They, quite literally, had his back.

  Ahead, the walkway veered left. Levi saw a faint glimmer of illumination, just the nimbus of it, not enough to tell what its source was. Still, he felt they must be approaching one of the hobo cat’s last markers, the glowing balls between which they had to pass.

  Yoda heard a soft scrape overhead just as Sunny saw a swift dark movement. They uttered sharp alert-growls simultaneously. Levi instantly reacted, trebling their speed. The two trailing dogs surged toward Levi even as they maintained the distances he had specified. Their reactions were not based on fear, but were logical responses to situations for which they had trained.

  A noose at the end of a line dropped where Levi had been, but now it was directly in front of Yoda. The Pomeranian, concentrating on running and listening, did not see the danger before him.

  But Sunny did.

  The Golden Retriever-mix put on a burst of speed and flashed past Yoda. She grabbed the noose in her jaws without slowing. The trapper had anticipated snaring and hoisting fourteen-pounds of Pomeranian, but now he had an eighty-five-pound express train. He let go of the snare a moment too late and arched, screaming, over the trio, landing on the asphalt street like a slab of beef on the butcher’s block. He rose and ran limping into the darkness.

  Sunny, having thrown off the snare-line, dropped back. They ran a few moments more, then Levi signaled a stop. Both Sunny and Yoda were winded from the sprint, but Levi breathed normally. He looked back into the darkness, only turning to his pack-mates when he was sure the danger to them was past.