Between a Bear and a Hard Place(41)

Without a moment’s pause, Jill darted to the front of the chopper and grabbed her friend’s shoulder, feeling sticky warmth on her palm. There was no hole in the windshield, no sign of any kind of bullet or anything else, but there was plenty of evidence that Jacques was bleeding. He still had his hand locked on the controls, but the grimace on his face told the whole story. “Claire! Come up here! Here, help him into the other seat.”

Confused, the younger woman grunted as the pilot slumped against her. The transition from his holding the controls to Jill was smooth, although there was some pitching and lurching. Claire getting him into the seat was slightly less graceful. He groaned, uttered a real curse this time, and clapped his hand over the wound opening in his shoulder. “What’n the hell happened? God awmighty this hurts like hell, burns, stings.”

“What hit him?” Claire hissed, ripping part of her shirt and stuffing it against the wound on the man’s chest. His blood was seeping through, but the pressure slowed it enough to give her hope that maybe he wouldn’t bleed out right here. “Whatever, we need to get him to the hospital. This wound seems like it’s getting bigger? How the hell is this possible?”

The helicopter yawed, pitched, and began to creak under the neophyte’s inexperienced steering. Jill hardened her eyes, staring dead on at the instrument panel, and checking everything as Jacques had told her. She was suddenly very glad she paid such close attention way back when. She never thought she’d need to know this stuff – especially not like this.

“The thing about helicopters that are supposed to go unseen is that there are a whole lot less lights than there normally are,” she grunted. “Is he breathing? Check his pulse.”

Claire did as instructed and reported the results – he was, but shallow, and his pulse was there, but weakening. “What is going on?” she demanded. “Tell me something!”

Jill gripped the yoke and pulled to the right, fighting another gust of wind and pulling the chopper higher up away from the treetops. “I don’t know,” she said through gritted teeth, “but every single instrument just went dead. You holding on?”

Before she could answer, Claire felt herself pitch to the side. Her hand shot out and she clutched the seatbelt she’d just clicked onto the wounded pilot. Her heart pounded so hard that she could feel the thump in her temples. “I am now,” she said, faking a laugh. “But he really needs a doctor. This wound is getting bigger somehow, he—”

As though to emphasize her point, Jacques sputtered, howled with pain, and clutched the wad of rags to his chest. “Spreading,” he croaked. “It’s... it’s spreading me open, I—”

His chin fell to his chest. “Shit!” Claire yelped. “Still breathing, still got a pulse,” she said. “But something’s happening to him. His neck is swelling, he’s not gonna last.”

She looked back at Jill, who clenched her eyes shut for a moment, obviously trying to steel her nerves. “We have to leave them,” she said with soft resolve. “We’ll come back, but right now he needs us worse than they do.”

Claire nodded, a tear misting up in the corner of her eye. “Do you think they’ll be okay?”

“They’ll be okay before he is,” she said, flicking her head to the side, indicating Jacques. I’ve seen them fight. So have you. I don’t know if they’ll be okay, but they’ve got a better chance than him.”

The helicopter swept down again before lifting higher into the sky. Clutching both the side of the chair, and the seatbelt as the chopper churned, Claire closed her eyes, trying to sense her bears the way she had before. She felt nothing – no tingle, no warmth.

“Okay,” she finally said. “Let’s do it.”

*

“The hell do you think this is going to do? Turning us against each other? There are only a handful of us left anyway!”

Rogue snarled at the figure in front of him, who had been pumping some kind of drug into the two bears they’d rescued for the past hour, maybe two. It was hard to tell without any sun or moon crawling across the sky. He looked left, then right, at the cold, soulless industrial installation.

The room was large and open, with doorways and alcoves dotting the entire expanse. The gas-masked figure was breathing slowly, or at least making some sort of noise meant to sound like breathing.

“You can talk, can’t you?” Rogue hissed.

King had a lump the size of a baseball on the side of his head that was red, swollen, and obviously painful. Stone and Fury were strapped onto cruciform hospital beds with thick, chain-like belts. Every time one of the lab coats approached and injected one of them, they’d both howl and snarl and growl, thrashing from side to side helplessly.