Between a Bear and a Hard Place(71)

“Holy shit, and now he’s pulling get-its with bad jokes. I wish King was here, he’d be right at home,” Rogue said, a sad smile crossing his face. “What’re the chances we’re going to find them?”

“In one piece? Alive? These are two different things.” He coughed. “Not high,” Eighty-Three said as Claire looked on, her eyes moving from face to face, studying them. She’d even started recognizing particular tics of Eighty-Three, like the way he cocked his head, or tugged at one of the sides of his faceplate from time to time. “Then again, you were both supposed to be dead. You were attacked by Clods and survived. You,” he pointed at Rogue, “somehow survived a broken back. You were bent like a crooked arrow, you—”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m still feeling it,” the gruff, brash bear said, cocking a half smile. “Let’s think instead about what we can do. After all, we both survived attacks that were supposed to kill us, right?”

Eighty-Three nodded.

“Broken Pines are made of sterner stuff than GlasCorp thinks,” Fury said. “We’ll get them back. There aren’t any chances or guesses. We’re getting them – and everyone else – back.”

“All right,” Rogue said. “I knew I liked this guy.”

For a second, Claire swore she saw an iris through the glass goggles on Eighty-Three’s. And then a moment later, she could almost see the corner of a thin-lipped mouth twitching in a smile.

“Wait,” she said. “I think I’ve got an idea.”

“Uh-oh,” Fury said, feigning a wince. “This could be dangerous.”

The punch she threw wasn’t very strong, but the kiss he caught her in afterwards? The strongest she’d ever felt.

*

“This,” Fury said, “is crazy.”

“Shut up.” Claire wasn’t paying much attention to him as she dug down into the fake sod and then the scrunchy, foam core ground that reminded her of so many middle school projects. “Time to get serious.”

“Right,” he said with a grin. “Serious about digging through fake dirt.”

Just about then, Claire struck again with her makeshift pick, and a beam of light shot skyward through the hole she’d punched. “I figured they’d at least have a ceiling.”

Fury took a deep breath and let it out slowly with a slight whistle on the end. “Would you look at that?”

As Claire bent to take a peak, Fury was already on the hacked phone, which was still dead but worked to contact Eighty-Three. “You would not believe what we just found,” he whispered. “It’s like a hive... an anthill, something.”

“Would you say it is like a well-oiled machine?” Claire heard the staticky voice ask.

“Yeah,” Fury said. “Something along those lines.”

“A well-organized colony?”

In the background, she could make out Rogue groaning heavily and then complaining about something to do with Eighty-Three’s attempts at humor.

“You could say that.”

“A smoothly-running—”

“Yes! Shit, at first he didn’t talk at all, and now he won’t stop. I can’t wait until he catches some Sanford and Son reruns and won’t shut up with the quotes.”

Claire sat back on her heels, shaking her head. “Wait, when did you see Sanford and Son?”

“They piped it into our cell most of the time on an old black and white television set that was stuck in the top corner. It went back and forth between that, Hill Street Blues and some infomercials.”

Watching the bear’s ruggedly beautiful face, she fetched the phone from his hand. “Eighty-Three?” she asked. “Uh, I think—”

“Would you say it resembles a perfectly-running factory?”

“More than you know,” she said. That seemed to stop him. “I think that we just found...” She looked up at Fury who was shaking his head. She took the message. “I think you better come here. Just trust me, okay?”

“Roger dodger,” he said, before clicking off the receiver.

“What’s that? I can’t really make it out, but it looks like,” Claire handed the binoculars to Fury. “Looks like someone in a wheel chair rolling around down there.”

A single word, two syllables, dripped from Fury’s lips with such hatred that Claire could feel the heat. “Eckert,” he hissed. “I’d know that sweaty egg-head anywhere. I can’t wait to take another bite out of him. This time though, I won’t leave anything to attach.”

What would have only months ago made Claire’s stomach wretch now did not. “I won’t be eating him,” she said, “but I want to get at least one good shot in. Deal?”