*
Pound looked over at his panting friend with a mix of curiosity and concern.
“You look like you’ve seen death,” Pound said as he walked over a little closer to Crush. The cat-man seemed to pay no attention at all to his friend’s voice, and when Pound placed his hand sympathetically on his arm, Crush was startled. The cat-man’s eyes were wide open, and when he turned his gaze toward Pound, there was a hint of fear deep beneath his customarily stern exterior. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah . . . yeah,” he replied in a not so truthful manner. Crush held out the cell phone in his hand, and though the light was a dim and altogether hazy blue, Pound recognized the instrument for what it was when an LED blinked once. The blink caught Crush’s eye, and he looked down at it for an instant before he finally seemed to catch up to his surroundings. He flipped the phone open and stared at the digital clock screen which told him it was past dark, and then he tapped a few of the buttons beneath the display as if in search for some needed information. Crush had come out of a fearful emotional state quickly, and as he flicked through the screens of applications, Pound stepped in a little closer to get a look. Crush pressed multiple icons on the screen, and finally, he opened a screen showing the missed calls. He scrolled to what he was looking for, and he held the phone up for Pound to see. With one finger under the number and the area code, Crush seemed steadier than ever.
“That number just called this phone up there in the office. Do you recognize it?” Crush asked as Pound took a second look.
“That’s a D.C. area code, but no. Should I?” Pound said as he placed a hand behind his own head to cradle his neck. Crush did not answer immediately, and so Pound pressed him further. “What happened up there?” Crush flipped the phone closed and placed it in his pocket with no answer, and he motioned for Pound to follow him as they quickly paced around the side of the building toward the garage in the basement. Pound knew where he was headed, and he shadowed him as Crush jogged down beneath the structure of the building which loomed above and into the sketchy obscurity of the basement garage. The mechanical arm at the entrance blocked the way for traffic, and they ducked beneath it. Then they went straight for the DAM vehicles stored in the far corner near the elevator. Crush picked out the compact car and reached down beneath the front driver’s side fender to feel for the spare key holder, and after a few seconds of groping behind the tire, his hand came out with the magnetic holder. He then slid the rectangular box open with his thumb and dropped the key into his other hand, and he closed the box and placed it back where he found it beneath the fender. Pound then stepped over to the passenger’s side and waited for the door to be unlocked while Crush opened the driver’s side front door. He pressed the ‘Unlock’ button to the passenger side door, and they both got into the small vehicle.
“Ready for a road trip?” Crush asked as he cranked the car and shifted into drive.
“Not really, but I suppose it doesn’t matter whether I am or not,” Pound replied. “My stomach is growling though. Did you bring me a can of tuna, too?”
“I wasn’t even able to get one for myself. Besides, I thought you said I needed to consider changing my diet,” Crush countered as he dug into his pocket and handed the flip phone to Pound who was completely puzzled by the rush to get back on the road.
“Do you want me to call in a pizza?” Pound said as he held the phone up.
“Yeah. Make it a tombstone,” Crush replied, and they drove through the raised mechanical arm and out into the streets of Baltimore. Pound returned a smirk and whirled the phone into the air with a toss and caught it in his hand. He then pointed it at Crush as if he were holding a rod and getting ready to spoil the child.
“Again, I don’t recognize the number. Are you going to fill me in or not?” Pound asked with a more irritated tone in his voice.
“I can only say that I don’t think my stash of tuna in the office up there is an option for either of us, Pound. I snatched that phone off of a dead guy,” Crush replied, and Pound dropped the phone into the cup holder between the seats as if it were contaminated with the ebola virus. Crush then pointed at the dead man’s inheritance which now laid in the residual coffee rings of the cup holder. “You should have recognized the number. I did as soon as I saw it. The last number that called that phone was a direct line from the office of the Director of the DAM,” Crush replied. “And that’s where we’re headed.”