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The weird thing about waking up was that he wasn't really waking up. Rather, Stephen gained a mounting awareness of the things around him, such as the fact that he was lying in bed, that everything around him was white, that there was a dull, but distant, pain in his ribs, and that he was saying... something to the other person in the room. A middle-aged man with a leg lying above the covers in a thick cast.

"What..." he said, trying to recover from the initial surprise, "...what was I saying?"

The man with the broken leg registered surprise.

"You're finally out of it, then?"

"Out of what?"

The man let out a single laugh. A loud 'hah!' that you'd need some form of advanced age to really get right.

"I don't know what they gave you, but it really messed with your head. Son, you've been rambling like a drunk."

"Oh."

"Yeah," the man continued, eager to share the story now Stephen would actually remember it, "you asked what time it was twenty times. At least!"

Stephen dug himself into his sheets, preparing for the recounting of shameful things he probably said. He'd seen that video of the girl at the dentist going on about how she wanted to be railed by Ryan Gosling, to the great embarrassment of her mother. He knew his own mind well enough to realize what sort of thing would have been on the forefront if he were in a similar state. But as the man's eyes lit up with what was no doubt to be a juicy fact, a nurse cut between them. The old, no-nonsense sort. Pear-shaped, short hair, and a chiseled expression of neutrality. She knew exactly what she was doing, and Stephen was grateful for that fact.

"You're lucid," she stated.

He took stock of his mind. Yup, seemed to be all in place. The memory of the last few minutes was entirely intact.

With the fact confirmed, the nurse called a doctor, and wasted no time putting the practical facts to him. His clothes were in the bed-side cabinet, but he might want to get some new ones. Are these your house keys? Yes, they are. Oh, here's your phone.

Screen cracked, unresponsive.

Fuck. Well, there went calling his boss and parents. At least the former would already know, and the latter didn't really need to right now, unless the doctor was to come in with a particularly grave look on his face. He felt no bandages beneath the covers, so he figured he wasn't heavily injured. No, better to wait with calling his parents until he was home. If he called them from the hospital, especially if he put _effort_into it, he'd have to talk them out of hopping onto the first flight.

Frankly, he thought, it was surprising how well he was taking having been almost crushed to death.

Wait... Frankly... Franky...

The residual memory of musky tiger sweat came back to him. The cat had thrown herself on top of him like a giant, orange airbag. Fuck. Was she OK? She wasn't here, obviously. But it's not like she'd fit. Maybe at a large scale ward? He'd have to look into it. But the way she was built it wouldn't surprise him if she'd shrugged off the concrete shower with nothing to show for it.

Before he could agonize about it too much, the doctor joined them, bearing no grave look on his long face. It was more of a casual disinterest, which was positively the most angelic way a doctor could look in the ER ward.

"You're lucky to be alive," the doc said.

Real original.

"I bet you get to say that a lot," he shot back.

"About once a week," the doctor said without pause. "Is that a lot?"

Stephen shrugged, and immediately regretted it, as a sharp pain shot through his body, radiating out from his midsection. He winced and sucked in air between his teeth.

"You've got a few bruised ribs. No internal damage. Some minor scrapes on your back, arms, and legs. You were without oxygen for a while, according to the ambulance crew, but you were breathing on your own. So I'm afraid you can't claim you died and came back to life."

"Guess I'll have to cancel my daytime talkshow appearances," Stephen said, refraining from shrugging or any other type of movement.

The doctor lifted his casual demeanor to crack a smile.

"I wouldn't. You're the most talkative patient we've had who's been crushed by a ton of rubble."

It wasn't rubble. It was a tiger. And she probably didn't weigh a ton, at least not literally. Probably. But he decided to leave that in the middle, for now. He had no idea how it would go on the books for the insurance company if he wasn't technically injured by falling rubble. Maybe it was paranoia, but he'd seen things pass his desk that put this sort of worry close to hand.

Oh, the riveting life of a construction safety clerk.

Wait, that was a good pun. He'd have to remember that one.

Then followed more of the same, though Stephen's mind was really only half there for it. He was shown some X-rays and scans that showed the surprising lack of damage. He was given some papers to sign, a bottle of pills, and a prescription for more. Painkillers, obviously. If he wanted to do anything more than lie on the couch without dropping to the floor and doing the excruciating pain dance, he'd be on them for a while. And even lying on the couch was iffy, depending on the couch.

They offered the use of a phone, naturally, but Stephen refused. Not out of any conviction of one sort or the other, but as a true child of the modern generation he had to admit he didn't know any number by heart. The reception desk would be happy to call a cab for him, and he could just do all the necessary calling and mailing from home.

He was leaving today, wasn't he?

Yes, he was. Hospital beds are expensive, and ribs heal anywhere. They'd keep him a few hours for observation, but he'd sleep in his own bed tonight.

And they did just that. He read a dog-eared magazine about interior fashion, dozed a little, and chatted with his roommate. The man's accident had been dreadfully boring for the horrible compound fracture he'd been given in return. Just a simple slip down the stairs.

Of course, Stephen went into a quarter hour monologue about the danger of stairs. Stairs were one of the biggest killers in modern society. Really, we keep an architectural feature in our houses that's almost perfectly designed to break bones and fracture skulls if you were to toss someone down it. That's exactly what the Aztecs did with prisoners and their monstrously steep temple stairs. No, the ideal stairs would be the opposite of Aztec stairs, with large, shallow steps.

It'd take up too much room, the older man wisely interjected.

But we could use playground slides, couldn't we? Much more fun, and much safer. Sure, you can't go up them, but that's half the danger eliminated. Just put them next to the regular stairs.

Eventually the man's son came to the ward, helping him into a wheelchair for easy transport. As he was about to be wheeled away, their brief intersection in each other's lives coming to an end, the man turned to him a last time.

"One more thing, son. I'm guessing you're not together with this Frank guy, but you wouldn't stop talking about him before." He gave a wink. "Nobody cares if you're into fat, hairy guys. Just listen to your heart."

Stephen attempted a stuttering response, but the old guy was already out of the door before he could think of anything, waving like the queen of Britain all the way. Goodbye, then. Watch out for those stairs.

Shit, what did he even say? Franky's bulk smothering anyone was sure to leave an impression, and at the time he'd been sure it was the last thing he'd ever experience. Plus, he'd spent a decent amount of time with her ass in front of his face. He knew himself. It had crossed his mind at least once how she had the proportions of a Robert Crumb character, and Crumb was an ass man if there ever was one.

Yeah, he probably talked about crawling up there like the snoid, the tiny man who loves fat asses so much that he lives in one.

It was probably better not to think about it. At the very least he'd have to thank Franky for, you know, the whole saving his life business. Better to leave out any speculations about how he thought he told some random stranger he'd like to crawl up her butt, but only because that's what his rational self thought he'd say with his inhibitions removed. It wouldn't be a good look.

Not entirely succeeding in banishing the thoughts of what his zonked out self would have wanted to do with the big tigress, Stephen buried his nose and mind in the interior decorating magazine once more. A bit of a tall order, given how far he was removed from the suggestions it offered. Who the hell would even spend that much on a rug? How come there aren't any magazines like this for people who don't have any money to spend? If anyone needed some smart suggestions, it was them.

When he was pondering the meaning of reclaimed wood tea cabinets running into the thousands, and considering that a dedicated tea cabinet wasn't that bad of an idea, they came to boot him out.

It wasn't quite that dramatic, but all hints of the stuff that turned him into a filthy-mouthed freak had worn off. Consequently the process of liberating himself from bed... wasn't fun.

He might have cursed a little.

OK, a lot.

With help of the nurse, who was thankfully built solidly enough to lean on, he eventually got it. She pulled him into some cheap sweatpants and a hoodie.

Just as he was trying to guess where the spare clothing had come from, the answer revealed itself.

"Thank God you're OK."

He'd know that voice anywhere, though he'd never heard it say anything close to what it was saying now. In the door opening stood a thin, tall man with a shock of ginger hair on his head, perpetual stubble on his chin, and office casual sense of dress.

Leonard Conroy. Otherwise known as 'the boss'. Because that's what he was.

"Wow. I'm getting the royal escort."

Conroy moved to support him. "I dropped everything as soon as I got the call."

He couldn't exactly blame the boss. The most risk any of them were ever in was of developing back pain, and not from heavy lifting, either. Maybe a papercut here and there, but honestly it'd been years since he ever heard anyone complain of one. Office workers really don't get as many papercuts as most people think.

The nurse rustled up a wheelchair, and Stephen quickly found himself sitting in it as his boss pushed him down the corridors of the hospital, a plastic bag with his own clothes sitting in his lap, the smell of pulverized concrete drifting up out of it.

"I'll drop you off at your place," Conroy said as they moved down the sterile white corridors. "And I'm putting you on sick leave for a week. We'll see how things go."

"I can work from home," Stephen feebly offered, but was acutely aware of how weak he sounded.

"What are they putting you on?"

Stephen fumbled around for the pill bottle, read the label.

"Tramadol."

Conroy laughed. "Just take the week, Stephen."

They rolled out into the parking garage, dark grays and the smells of exhaust fumes and filthy asphalt replacing the bright whites and disinfectant. Conroy's Lexus was that sort of management vehicle that slyly tries to look subdued, with enough hints to show that it is, indeed, better than anything you can afford. But that meant the seats were comfortable, which was of the utmost importance right now.

"What about the investigation?" He offered as they pulled out onto the road.

"We're putting the spotlight on this, Stephen. One of our guys getting into an accident during a safety walk is extremely embarrassing."

He thought of Franky. Would she catch any flak for this? Officially, she'd be responsible for him on the site. The construction company would be looking for a scapegoat, if he knew companies.

"You'll get a call in due time. So get a new phone, OK?"

"What about my report?"

Maybe it was a silly question, but he'd made a few observations there that he wouldn't want anyone else to take any meaning from.

"We found the clipboard, but the entire thing is practically unreadable. Don't worry about it, we're starting from scratch on this one."

They turned down the road to Stephen's apartment. Conroy helped Stephen out and to his front door. The comfort of his home close, his mind was already wandering to thoughts of doing absolutely nothing at all. Before he closed the door, a quizzical look formed on the boss' face.

"What does 'tail danger' even mean, anyway?"

In his mind's eye, he had pictured himself weathering his injury with dignity and practicality. What that exactly would have looked like, he didn't know. It was more of a vague desire, to use his week's free time to set things up in a way to make things easy for himself.

However, nothing came of it. Tramadol turned out to be a real knockout drug, and Stephen found himself doing very little at all. He became well acquainted with YouTube, Netflix, and the various take-out places near him, as his already rudimentary instinct for housekeeping broke down completely. He got online with his friends, true enough, but his distant, cloudy demeanor was rather more a source of entertainment than anything else.

Then there were the dreams. Weird, waking dreams, and weird, sleeping dreams. They were filled with falling rubble, the smell of dust in the air, and giant, fluffy tigresses. The dream tigresses jumping on him, smothering him beneath big bellies, breasts, and butts. One time he woke in complete clarity, the pain in his ribs gone. He cleaned his apartment in a breeze, pulled on his coat, and opened the door to step outside, only to see that before him there was only a sheer drop down. Soft, orange fur to both sides, and a giant tail swishing to and fro overhead. Then he woke up for real, sweating in his bed, morning wood mocking him from under the covers.

Well, he had himself to thank for that image. Himself and Robert Crumb.

It was only near the end of the week that he started looking into phones. It was hard enough to make sense of all the features, payment plans, and whatever when your brain is off floating somewhere near the ceiling. If it hadn't been an absolute necessity he'd have put it off as easily as he did with the dishes and the laundry, but the words of the boss nagged in his mind. An investigation, and a reevaluation of his sick leave. The pain had lessened, so maybe he could be of some use again.

Thanks to the blessings of modern society the next day a delivery guy dropped off the package, within a nondescript, budget line phone he'd picked more out of randomness and need than any real interest. He made the painful decision to leave the pills be for a while, and slotted in the SIM from his previous device.

As soon as he booted up, a long list of notifications rolled down the screen. He should have seen that coming. All of his app groups went on without him. But... no, he hadn't installed his apps yet. He squinted at the icons. New e-mails were nicely condensed in their own category, but the rest had that tell-tale icon of an old fashioned telephone next to them.

Missed calls.

Who called people anymore? He got maybe two calls per week, on average.

The feeling he'd done something wrong sneaked up on him. The opiate had been a snug blanket against the world, and without it he was suddenly reminded of such things as responsibilities and obligations. Sure enough, there were multiple calls from his boss, from his parents, friends, but also a load of numbers that didn't ping number recognition.

Maybe if they were old fashioned enough to call, they were old fashioned enough to leave voice mail.

"Hello honey," his mother's voice chimed from the tinny speaker, "we heard there was an accident on the news. I know it's silly to be worried, but give us a call, OK? Your aunt says hi."

The news? Of course, there had been an article somewhere saying 'man injured in construction accident', but those didn't even gain traction on the internet. And his mom still read the paper.

Next message.

"Hey Stephen, Leonard here. I told you to get a new phone. Look, the case has blown up, so just sit tight, alright? Call me when you can."

Next message.

"Hello Mr. Clover, I'm calling on behalf of the Local Bugle. We're covering the accident you were involved in, and would be interested in interviewing you on the ordeal you went through. If you're interested, ask for Sam Worthy. Take care."

He knew the Local Bugle. They were neither local, nor a bugle. They printed lurid tales about weird, gullible people for weird, gullible people. Stuff like how a celebrity with a rumored allergy was rumored to visit exclusively labradoodle prostitutes. How the fuck had these vultures gotten his number?

It didn't stop there, either. An impressive array of media people paraded past on his voicemail server, not even all of them total ambulance chasers. There were some real newspapers represented here, some real websites, and even a real television show.

Daytime television.

The more unscrupulous headline-hunters called multiple times, checking in a few days later to turn off their unresponsive target with increasingly hyperbolic language, offers of payment where there first had been the public interest, and vaguely threatening language.

Christ, the boss wasn't kidding. At least it was only the ass-end of media that no-one took seriously. Without planning or intending it he'd gone off the grid quite successfully. Maybe the entire thing had already blown over.

At that moment, as he pondered the treasure trove of trash media in his hand, the phone's standard ringtone blared through its tiny speakers with amazing volume. Stephen jumped at the sudden noise, immediately regretting it owing to the equally sudden stabbing pain in his sides, clutched at his sides in pure instinct, and immediately dropped the phone.

And that thing was so new there were still stickers on it. Cursing himself, Stephen got down to floor level at the best speed he could manage. Which is to say, his grandfather would do a better job of it. Granted, the old man could get down on the floor with such alacrity that it could, and had, landed him in the hospital, whereas Stephen had taken the reverse course. But he was in luck. The screen was uncracked, and the caller persistent.

Another unknown number. His first instinct was to let it ring, to remain excommunicated for another day, but the words of Conroy swam back into his memory. Investigation. Not to mention the other in-word, insurance.

With a smooth motion he flicked his thumb over the phone's screen and listened, half expecting a media vulture.

"Hello? Stephen? You there?"

A voice like the rolling thunder of an early autumn storm. It had a familiar growl around its edges, spoken past sharp teeth.

"Franky?"

"Yeah. Listen, we need to talk."

With some effort he managed to locate some socially acceptable clothing, and with considerably more effort managed to pull it onto himself. Just a hoodie and jeans, of which he was sure at least one had seen a washing cycle somewhere recently. Hands thrust in pockets he fondled the pill bottle, unopened, like a talisman. It'd be there if he needed it.

Franky hadn't been talkative. No 'how are you?' or 'glad you're not dead', just the name of an establishment. It stuck in his head as the city passed by the bus' windows. In fact, the entire tigress had stuck in his head for a week, now. Maybe that's why he thought there ought to have been a bit more.

The bus vomited him out at his stop, in a neighborhood he normally only saw from the other side of the windows. Once, it had been the heart of the city's blue collar population, but that time was visibly coming to an end. Modern glass facades stood tightly drawn up between rustic, unassuming brickwork, here and there oppressive concrete reminding people what efficiency looked like. Where once factory workers with flat caps would have lounged aggressively on street corners puffing on roll-ups, now stood hipsters with beards and beanies being aggressively non-offensive. They at least still smoked roll-ups, though. Away from the main streets some old-fashioned businesses still clung to a precarious half-life between their modern counterparts. Stuck away in side streets and alleys still existed unassuming dive bars, simple barbers, and the like. But even here the spectre of gentrification crept closer, as evidence by a run-down old noodle place sat across the street from its alternate reality self, loud advertisements rolling past on flatscreen billboards behind floor-to-ceiling glass.

In one of those side streets an old warehouse stooped wearily between two modern buildings, unassuming aside from the garish neon sign over its giant double cargo doors. 'Big Joe's' the sign read, though the 's' flickered more off than on. That's the place Franky told him to come to, and the big doors weren't just there for nostalgia. The giants standing outside, drinking and smoking at standing tables the size of parasols, cast strange glances at him as he made his way inside. His being out of place was obvious, but it was so obvious that it couldn't be chalked up to any sort of social unawareness. He clearly meant to be here, so they said nothing.

Inside, in that typical bar gloom, his confidence left him somewhat. It was a bar writ large, everything being bigger and louder. A dozen conversations rumbled together like a freight train, glasses slammed onto tables or clinked in toasts like industrial activity. The cadence of people simply walking, let alone stamping their feet, traveled through the floorboards with a subtle vibration that made Stephen realize just how tiny he was. Subconsciously he put his arms around his aching ribs, though it would do him little good if one of these people didn't see him and stepped back...

Even as he searched the crowd for a flash of orange and black, the flash of orange and black found him. With a call and a waving arm Franky brought his attention to a table near the wall.

"Squishy coming through! Watch it! Squishy coming through!"

Eyes turned to him as people gingerly checked their feet. Legs like tree trunks moved aside to let him pass. Sure, it was better than tapping people on the thighs and hoping they didn't think he was an itch, but it felt very much like being on the other side of that thing everyone does when there's a toddler at an adult party.

Franky sat casually leaning back in a battered chair, legs wide, one arm slung over the back. With the other she gestured to the opposite side of the table, a real shit-eating grin plastered on her fuzzy face. The sharp teeth made it look somewhat menacing still.

"Have a seat."

There stood not an upsized normal chair, but a straight-from-the-beach lifeguard chair. Turns out they're just the right size to let a 'squishy' sit at the table. Give it its own, little table and the toddler theme could continue.

Forgetting himself, Stephen took hold of the rungs and made to pull himself up, winced, cursed, and nearly doubled over at the stabbing pain in his sides. God damnit. Of course he can't climb a ladder. What was he thinking?

"You OK?" Franky said with a casual form of concern.

"My ribs are fucked." He glanced up at the impossible height. "I'm going to need a hand."

That was the literal description, as it turned out. Franky just scooped him up, carefully, with both shovel-sized hands, depositing him in the chair with only a brief stab of pain.

Yeah, she looked incredibly pleased with herself as she put her fat ass back down in her own chair, predatory eyes twinkling with mischief, whiskers splayed proudly wide, the tip of her knock-out tail swaying behind her back.

With no hardhat to obscure it he could see she had a haphazardly cut head of hair, though it seemed more an outgrowth of thick fur battered into submission, continuing the pattern of her pelt in an unintentional display of avant garde fashion. That was really the only bit of fashion about her, because otherwise she was unapologetically the opposite of fashionable, wearing a baggy T-shirt with a faded print that did nothing to flatter anything while also not hiding her belly or...

Tits.

They were pretty big, Stephen noticed. Hey, it's the male gaze, he couldn't really blame himself. And not just big in the absolute sense, which they absolutely were, but also in the relative sense. For her size, Franky was well endowed, her bust being just as robust as the rest of her.

Jesus, Stephen, get a grip. First you're checking out her ass, and now her breasts? This woman could bend you into a pretzel and then eat you like one. He might go well with the barrel of beer she'd worked half her way through.

"You look like shit warmed over." Franky said.

"Glad to see you're doing well, too. I was kinda worried."

She bellowed out a burst of laughter. "It'll take more than a few pebbles."

"Thanks, by the way. For saving my life and all."

"Nah," she waved away the accusation with a meaty paw, "you were just in the way, is all."

"In that case, fuck you for crushing me."

She seemed to appreciate that.

"So how's it feel to be dead?" she asked.

Wait. What?

"You're going to have to explain that one to me."

"Haven't been keeping up with the news?"

"Uh, no?" He attempted a moderate shrug, but didn't feel like he got it across. "I've been high off my ass on painkillers, and my phone was busted. Still is. I got a new one. Anyway, I had a dozen missed calls from journalists."

Her black lips curled into a grimace. "Guess that explains it."

From a pocket she fished a phone, or rather a tablet that looked like a phone in her hands. She stabbed a finger at the screen a few times and turned it to him. Corralled between bands of bottom feeder advertisements and the very latest celebrity gossip was a thick and flashy headline:

'Crushing news: Construction behemoths kill safety inspector.'

The Local fucking Bugle. He hadn't picked up the phone, and that'd been enough for them. That wasn't the only thing, either. A quick glance at the body of the article revealed lurid, and entirely made up, details about an anti-human conspiracy among the large scale workers.

"Nobody takes that shit seriously," he said more for his own benefit than anything, then thought of something that would benefit him more. "I need a beer."

As he turned to search the room for a server he found his senses jarred by the perspective. It wasn't like he had truly forgotten where he was, but the autopilot part of his brain had taken him sitting at a table as a sign that everything had returned to normal. It hadn't, and that part did responded to that revelation by inducing a spike of vertigo. Not enough to make the room spin, but it definitely moved by a few degrees.

The problem was, Stephen decided, the deceptive normalness of everything now he was up high. The barkeep tapped a glass, and the way the beer gushed from the tap just didn't look quite right, just as the foam collar it formed didn't look quite right. Without any other frame of reference, such as a normal sized person, these were the only things that hinted at the fact that the bar was actually large enough that you could rent out the cupboards as student housing.

Did everything look like this for them, too? The entire world a delicate dollhouse? Or did the brain stop jolting itself after enough exposure?

Having refrained from flagging down anyone, a waitress came over anyway. Then again, he could see her coming from across the room, and he was pretty sure she'd seen him, too. Because she was a giraffe, slender neck reaching out even above most of the giants in this place. She probably never went to the movies, but she was born for a job like this.

"Hey Franky!" the giraffe girl gave a cheery greeting from on high.

Figures. This place might as well be a small town bar, with its select clientele.

"Zoe. Looking good." Franky flashed her a toothy smile. Was she capable of giving a normal smile, or did they all look like she was about to pounce? She held up the barrel-sized glass, which had somehow become empty while he wasn't watching. "I'll take another one, and one for my tiny buddy."

It was understood he'd also be drinking from a tiny glass, he hoped. After a week of no drinking and bad food he wasn't particularly in the mood to level the big guns at his liver quite yet.

"What about the other papers?" he asked once the waitress had left.

"Eh..." The tigress shrugged her broad shoulders. "Same bullshit, kinder words. They're just guessing, and they're guessing wrong."

"But you didn't call me over just to talk about the news, right?" It seemed pretty obvious to him. Even though it was slightly paranoid, if the more unscrupulous journalists could in some way eavesdrop on his phone, they would.

She leaned back with a deliberate slowness, the wood of the chair creaking like an old house in winter. "This shit's hurting people. Good people, not just me. They're spinning this into being about all of us, big people I mean. Guys've been put on half hours already, union won't stand up for us."

"But that's all nonsense. No serious paper would print it." He hoped he was right in having that much faith in the media. No doubt it was only contained to tabloids and agitator websites. "Besides, the investigation isn't even looking into large scale workers. As far as they're concerned rocks fell, nobody died."

"You know who gives a fuck about the investigation? No-one." The growl in Franky's voice grew as she spat the words, whiskers bristling. "And the 'serious' newspapers just use it as a reason to talk about the shit they really want to talk about."

She was scary when angry, but at least she looked kind of cute doing air quotes.

"And what's that?" she continued. "Big folk doing jobs little folk can't, big folk earning more, and this bullshit pseudo-scientific, Freudian glorification of machine power as if introducing a collection of designers, mechanics, trainers, drivers and shit doesn't add way more opportunity for failure!" She simmered down to a grumble. "I swear, there are people taking kickbacks from CAT."

Zoe the giraffe returned with their drinks, placing another pool's worth of beer under Franky's nose, while thankfully giving Stephen something more manageable. Still a larger glass than he was used to from any regular bar, but he'd soldier his way through it somehow.

The interruption left Franky to stare sullenly at her glass for a while. Where first her whiskers had bristled fiercely, they now hung limp. Even the black and white stripes on her face seemed to accentuate a more contemplative expression. Her eyes flicked up at him, and for a moment she seemed more kitten than tigress before they returned to their previous hardness.

"I got kinda carried away. You're pretty easy to talk to, you know that?"

In fact, he did know that, because people had said it before. Instead of saying that, he just answered "Thanks."

"Thing I wanted to ask is, it'd be nice if you could do... something."

For the moment Stephen hid behind his glass, taking a generous swig of generic pilsner. The first beer since the accident. He feared the favor Franky was about to ask, and he feared whether he'd be able to refuse.

"What were you thinking of?"

"You said they tried calling you, yeah?"

He nodded.

"So do an interview, tell 'em what you just told me. That we're not even on the radar."

Yeah, that was what he was expecting.

"The investigation is still going. Going to the media about that... I might as well climb onto my boss' desk and piss in his face." He tried to sound as apologetic as possible, but the beer was hitting him with unexpected confidence. "Besides, it's giving them exactly what they want. Accidents happen, we investigate, improve, and the media never gives a shit."

It's not like accidents in construction were particularly rare, least of all with things falling down. Though, most of the time that was the workers themselves. Falling from great heights was the leading cause of death among construction workers, and it had nothing to do with their size or animal nature.

On the other side of the table Franky grumbled, shifting in her chair to creaking protest. Under the need for action, he figured, she realized he was right. Her slouch was oddly photogenic, making her appear like an understated, ill-kempt, furred Venus. That is, until she idly scratched her big belly.

Or maybe that was just the beer talking. Boy, it packed a punch.

"What if they don't stop?" she growled. "What if your investigation says I crushed you, and they just cherry-pick that?"

He shrugged, and didn't regret it quite as much as before. Thanks, beer. "Then I'll come out and say they're full of shit. The company will, too. We could even hit them with a lawsuit."

"Union won't pay for it," she said, washing the acidity in her voice down with a swig.

"What's this with the union?"

Those yellow eyes hardened. "Officially, we do construction equipment work. Some work-around to make sure we get enough pay to eat, but now some bastard got it into his head that means we fall outside regular union representation."

Stephen didn't say anything. It sucked, but he knew nothing about how the union worked.

"There's always been people gunning for our jobs," Franky continued to fill the silence. "It's not like we can go work in a fucking office pushing pencils or something..."

Those yellow eyes regarded him from behind a giant glass of beer. "No offense."

"None taken."

It made sense. People her size were, what, 3% of the population? 3% that needed special... everything. Clothes, transport, services... bars. And, naturally, jobs. It hadn't been too difficult in the past, but in modern society construction was one of the few places left where they could leverage their size. Consequently they were massively over represented in the construction business, hence his safety evaluation in the first place. That, the military, heavy industry, and beyond that you had to look at specialist jobs. Of course, Franky wasn't being completely honest: They could just get an office job. With a regular office salary having to pay for all those specialized services, not to mention the food. Shit, the beer Franky was working her way through was already a good night out for most people.

With that in the back of his mind, he could understand her concern.

"It'll be fine. Some bottom feeding ambulance chasers or some cunt in the union aren't going to make you less essential." He made a sweeping gesture with his arms and caught himself letting out a laugh. "What are they going to do? Buy a bunch of machines, train the people to use them, do that at higher cost? In a world of emission standards and anti-discrimination laws? It's just not going to happen."

He could feel a fuzzy mellowness radiate off Franky and felt a deep sense of satisfaction at that. Beer always made him a little more willing to put the truth out there. Yeah, she seemed positively like a soft plush animal, now. One he wouldn't mind snuggling up to.

Wow, where did that come from? Damnit, Stephen. Though, the world did seem to have a softer hue around him. Was the beer really hitting him this hard after a week of no drinking?

"I guess you're right. So we just do nothing? Wait it out?"

"Yeah," he nodded, feeling like a bobblehead. "We can always do something later."

"We should keep in touch."

Yes! Yes we should!

"That's sensible."

He looked at the glass in his hand. He'd only drunk half of it, but he'd had enough. In fact, the world seemed to swim before him as if he were looking out into it from an aquarium, his limbs having a watery weightlessness to them.

"Maybe I need to go," he said. "I feel kinda woozy."

Franky arched an eyebrow, big fuzzy face leaning closer to examine him, cocking her head slightly. She looked him in the eyes, then smiled.

"You on painpills?"

"Yeah." Was his voice slurring? He couldn't tell. "But I didn't take any today. Except for one in the morning."

Did Franky take a lot of regular pills, or did she use giant pills?

"Maybe you're a little extra sensitive. It happens." The tigress gulped down the rest of her beer and slammed the empty glass onto the table with a startling boom. "I'll help you down."

It's not like he could have gotten down on his own, anyhow. Not without performing the graceful move of falling onto his face.

Standing on his feet, he realized he'd made the right call. While the floorboards had the look of well worn wood, they felt more like rubber under his feet. In fact, his legs felt like rubber, but at least still a stiff sort of rubber. He remained standing.

Behind and above him Franky bellowed his war cry.

"Squishy coming through!"

With all the confidence he could wring out of his rubbery legs Stephen stumbled forward, and immediately had the world disappoint him. What he could only perceive as a blur, a big blur, came from the forest of legs around him and slammed into his side. The pain was immediate, as was the momentum. He made a cursory attempt at keeping his legs under him, but it really only were his instincts trying to do something for the sheer hell of it. He hit the floor, slid, rolled, and came to a stop.

The very first thing he noticed was the pain. He'd noticed it when he'd been hit, but it were now fiery streaks down his sides, so it was perfectly acceptable to notice it again. The second thing he noticed was that the din of the establishment around him dropped to silence, only to pick up again shortly in a very localized way.

Franky, not exactly dainty at the best of times, growling, hissing, and spitting at a hapless looking moose man. A low, rumbling sound like rolling thunder in which he could only barely make out words.

"Are you fucking deaf? You fucking idiot, you could have killed him. You fixin' to go to jail? You want this place closed down?"

Her fur stood on end, eyes ablaze, ears flat. Sharp teeth flashed like knives. With a final growl she shoved the moose back, arms like industrial pistons slamming into the guy's shoulders with a thunderclap. Immediately she seemed to forget about the moose and turned to Stephen, motioning others away from around him.

"You OK?"

"Been better," he said through gritted teeth.

Before he could fully grasp what was going on he felt the touch of coarse fur, powerful arms lifting him from the ground. She didn't set him on his feet, rather cradling him like a child. And he was perfectly OK with that, given the combination of the world feeling like a bouncy castle and his ribs feeling like a portal to hell. When he realized that the soft cushion he was resting against was one of Franky's breasts... well, he'd agonize later on how he was supposed to feel about it, but for the moment he wasn't complaining. Being this close to her he caught a familiar, musky scent.

"I do mean it, you know," he spoke up to her as she carried him to the door.

She gave a grunt with a question mark at the end.

"I really would've been dead without you. I'll tell everyone who wants to hear."

"And now I almost got you killed. We're even."

"No, we're not." He smiled. "You still owe me lunch."

She returned the smile. "When this shit blows over, I'll fucking wine and dine you."

That seemed nice. He wouldn't mind being wined and dined, even by a tigress who probably wasn't being entirely serious about it.

As they exited the warm rays of the sun reached down to blind Stephen, his eyes still used to the dim interior of Big Joe's. This was symbolic for rebirth, wasn't it? Being carried out of the womb into the gentle, yet overwhelming light of the world. He could hope, couldn't he?

The answer came in the form of the sound cue of a digital camera, then several more.

Across the alleyway stood a man, just a guy, with a too-large camera, wearing a leather jacket he had a bit too much pudge for, and too much stubble for his pudge. But the smile, the mirthful eyes above it squinting at them, spoke the true story.

A story that'd be in print tonight, and in the racks tomorrow.