Pavlov's Dogs by D.L. Snell, Thom Brannan Page B

security glass. Samson edged toward the door, bit by bit. Dr. Crispin’s finger hovered over a button.
    Samson moved, about to look in through the window, and then Crispin’s finger came down. The image on the monitor erupted in a flash of light, and Crispin and Donovan jumped as the tinny sound of an explosion rocked the headphones. Vital signs spiked at the bottom of the display.
    “Ah, damn it,” Crispin whispered, taking his finger off the controls. He watched the screen in horror, grimacing and typing as Samson’s pulse and respiration leapt.
    Donovan stood back, knowing better than to ask questions as the project director typed in a string of commands. The motion on the screen stopped, and Crispin blew out a breath. He scratched at his chin for a second, then began typing again, fingers flying over the modified keyboard.
    Onscreen, a black-furred arm came up and one talon pointed at the shotgun that had produced the burst of light. Crispin typed again, and the display swung from side-to-side. He pulled a microphone out of the console and spoke into it.
    “Samson, this is Crispin. Stand down. I am returning control.” He sat back and slapped at a glowing square button on the console. Looking up, he caught the sharp concentration on Donovan’s face.
    “As you probably have inferred, I can override one or all of the Dogs from here,” he said. “The idea was to slow them down or stop them if one of their targets was deemed fit for interrogation instead of termination. But I also installed this quick release...” He pointed at the square button, which was no longer glowing. “The QR returns control to the Dogs in case they need to react independently.”
    Donovan indicated the keyboard, which had another full row above the function keys. “And this is the controller?”
    Crispin nodded. “It is.” He stroked his fingers over the extra row of keys. “These are the shortcuts, if you will. Each one has a string of commands tied to it to save time and facilitate ease of coordination between the Dog packs, if needed.” He turned and pointed at the bookshelf that spanned from one wall to the next. It was crammed with two-inch binders and what looked like military manuals.
    “You’ll find all of this in there,” he said. “I did the bulk of the programming myself, but every now and again, hah, I find the need to consult the Wall.”
    Donovan walked to the expansive bookshelf and plucked a binder from it. It was densely packed with folded papers, with a four-page table of contents at the front. He picked a folded sheet at random and pulled it out, revealing a three-foot, one-line diagram of system interconnections inside a panel labeled TxRx-3.
    “What’s TxRx-3?” he asked.
    Absently, Crispin pointed at a spot on the far wall as he put the headphones back on. There, where he pointed, Donovan saw a small door built into the metal wall. The neurotech put the binder down and walked over, sure Crispin had made an error.
    That access door can’t be more than four inches square. Surely...
    He got close enough to read the letters etched into the metal surface.
    “TxRx-3,” he said.
    Twisting the little handle, he opened the access door and peered inside. Donovan sucked in a breath. There, in the space behind the door, was a circuit board ringed on all sides by filaments of wire. He closed the door and looked at the rest of the wall where he stood. From top to bottom, there were twenty such access doors, and another twenty next to those.
    “Fascinating.”
    Looking back at the thick binder, Donovan saw that the cover said TRANSMIT/RECEIVE. He put it back on the shelf. “Is this how you get the commands to the Dogs? And how you get their readings?”
    Crispin nodded.
    “But there are only fourteen Dogs. You have forty modules. What are these, built-in spares?”
    “Not exactly,” Crispin said. “The... hold on. Yes!” He reached out and turned off the monitor. “Come with me, Dr. Donovan. We are going to