Genesis Echo (Deathlands 25) by James Axler

“Shows a sad lack of the romantic. Why not Stoutheart or Valiant?”

“There wasn’t any other marking on it, was there, Dean?” Ryan said.

“The three white patches. One foot was white, as well. And the collar.”

“Nothing else?”

“No, Dad. I can’t go and look because I threw the body in the lake.”

“That wasn’t very ecologically correct,” Mildred said. “Couldn’t you have buried it?”

“No, ‘course not, Mildred. That’s a pretty triple-stupe sort of idea, isn’t it, Dad?”

Ryan hesitated. “Well, different people have different ideas. Truth is, I’d probably either have left the body where it was oror I’d have thrown it in the lake.”

“Well” The boy beamed at Mildred, who rutted in disapproval.

“Point of fact, son, I wish you hadn’t heaved it in the water. There was something about it that made me wonder.”

“Wonder what, Ryan?” J.B. asked. “About how healthy it looked? And that weird collar?”

“Yeah. I’ll go and walk along a ways, see if it’s still floating where I can get at it.”

“I’ll come,” Jak offered.

“Sure thing.” He looked at the sky. “This is such a good place, I think we’ll camp here for the night.”

They made their way toward the spot where the dog had come out of the undergrowth and menaced Dean. The afternoon was wearing on, and the shadows were lengthening. Out in the middle of the lake, a huge trout leapt and sparkled in the spray. And across the far side the two men saw a small herd of deer, browsing quietly.

“Could live forever here,” said the albino teenager.

“Nobody lives forever, Jak.” Ryan looked around. “Was it near here?”

“Think so. Before bit of land sticking out.”

Ryan stood with his back to the forest, trying to make out the corpse of the dog, which should still have been floating, sodden, in the lake.

Then be heard a noise that raised his hackles, a deep, menacing growl.

Chapter Fourteen

The dog started toward them, tail out, moving one careful paw at a time. Its teeth were bared, and a yellow dribble of froth was sliding from its jaws. The sunlight danced on the silver collar.

“It’s the same dog,” Jak breathed, his right hand reaching behind him for the taped hilt of one of his leaf-bladed throwing knives.

“Can’t be. Got a .38 bullet buried in its brain. It was chilled. You saw it. I saw it.” Ryan drew the SIG-Sauer as the dog approached, stiff-legged, closing within thirty feet of them. “It was an ex-dog, Jak.”

“So, what’s this? Ghost? Manitou? Shape changer? Come on, Ryan. Tell me.”

The dog hunkered, bloodshot eyes fixed on the two men, as though it were trying to decide which was going to have his genitals ripped from his body.

Ryan’s finger tightened on the trigger. Despite his undoubted nerve and combat bravery, he couldn’t shake off a feeling of near superstitious dread.

It wasn’t just a similar sort of animal.

It was the same dog.

“Do it,” Jak whispered.

Ryan shot the big dog through one of the trio of snow-white patches of fur in the middle of its chest. The 9 mm round went clean through the animal’s body, blowing out a ragged, bloodied chunk of flesh the size of a grapefruit from under the ribs on the left side.

The animal went down kicking, trying to bite itself in the center of the exit wound, legs scrabbling in the small stones of the beach. Blood gushed from its body, pumping slower and slower. It toppled over, after trying to make it toward the safety of the forest, twitching and lying still.

“Now that’s a dead dog,” Ryan said, bolstering the warm blaster.

He turned at the sound of running feet, everyone brought by the gunshoteveryone except Abe, who had chosen that moment to go into the woods to relieve himself. He had just appeared, pants at half-mast, trying to see what had happened.

“Not another dog,” said Dean, first there.

Trader stopped in his tracks. “Not another dog. It’s the same fucking animal!” He grinned in triumph at Ryan. “Told you the slut didn’t I mean Mildred couldn’t be that good with a revolver. Nobody could be. Grazed it and it recovered. Got to be the fucking answer, don’t it?”