Between a Bear and a Hard Place(70)

“And the eyes?”

“They are for keeping the cameras clean. My actual eyes are not very strong anymore. I would rather not go into the intricacies of my anatomy because,” the non-contracting voice hummed to a halt for a moment. “I am not, myself, sure. My memories come back only infrequently. I only remember faceless men, or masked ones. I remember screams, and then nothing else. You are aware that I could break this?”

Rogue, Fury, and Claire all exchanged a confused glance as their captive simply pulled on the chain binding his wrists and broke it with no effort at all.

“Why did you—?”

“Because if we are going to break into the building together to rescue your friends and get my answers, I needed you to trust me.”

“That makes a surprising amount of sense,” Claire said.

“You call me a robot, but you are continuing to be surprised when I think logically?”

He had them there.

Claire looked at him, equal parts Data, Darth Vader, and someone who had, in fact, rescued all three of their lives in the wake of a clone attack. Clone attack. Clones? This can’t be real, can it? I never asked that about magical werebears, but for some reason, the idea of actual clones replacing my friends is... well if anything is a step too far, that would be it.

“I am smiling,” he said in a tone so flat that it must have been a joke. “And that was a joke. I do not have lips. At least, not like the ones you are used to seeing.”

There was a hole – a palpable, gnawing hole. They spent so long separated from the other Broken Pine alphas that when she finally saw Jill again, she felt like she’d come back to an old friend. The worst of it though was the horrible feeling of betrayal.

“How did I not know it?” she asked herself more than anyone else. “How could I be so close to him, feel him against my skin like that, feel him,” she swallowed and blushed lightly. “Just... how?”

Rogue put a massive, callused hand on her shoulder. Fury slipped his arm around her waist. “He fooled us both,” the softer-spoken, slightly-smaller bear whispered. “And if you think you feel bad, imagine being cooped up in a cell with him your whole life and still being fooled.

Still, a shudder crept through Claire’s body, chilling her soul. She’d looked into those things’ eyes. She had seen the awful, wretched reality of what GlasCorp was capable of, and worst of all? She was a part of the whole tragedy.

“Holy shit,” she breathed, sitting down hard on a stump that was luckily nearby, else she would have ass-planted in a patch of squishy moss. Eighty-Three, Rogue, and Fury all looked her way at the same time. She just started shaking her head. Back and forth, back and forth, her brain felt like the pendulum in a really awful clock that had done really awful things without even knowing it.

“I trapped all of you. I did all this. If it weren’t for me, you’d still have your clan,” she looked at the bears, and then to Eighty-Three, “would still have your family and your identity and your memories and whatever else you’ve lost.”

“Now wait just a minute,” Fury said, though when he stood, Rogue joined him. “I don’t know you how figure you had anything to do with things that went twenty years ago.”

“Or ten. Or... however many it’s been.”

“Hey!” Fury piped up. “You used a contraction! That’s very good!”

“Thank you,” Eighty-Three hummed.

Claire indulged in a brief smile before her gloom took her again. “It’s just... I was right there, the whole time this was going on. God damn it, I went to the lab where they were keeping you,” her eyes pleaded with Fury, moist with tears that needed to escape. “My mate, my love, I walked by your cage every night for years and never knew anything about it, except that every time I went downstairs my birthmark itched. I thought I had a fungus or something.”

Eighty-Three’s voice box clicked, he let out a humming sound and fell silent for a short moment. “Actually,” he said, “did you just say you worked in the lab where they held the fleabags?”

“First he uses contractions, now he’s trying out humor. You’re the closest thing to a teenager I’ve ever come across that didn’t have acne,” Fury said.

“I might,” Eighty-Three replied. “I don’t remember.”

Everyone sat uncomfortably until he started up with that weird, whirring laugh. “And now I’m trying self-deprecation. Do you see? You insulted me by calling me a teenager, but then said I did not have acne. I, not particularly knowing what I look like under all of this, said that I might actually have acne. Do you see?”