“Look,” she finally says. “Are you going to send someone over?”
“They’re already on the way.”
“Already on the way? I never gave you my address.” Julie trembles. “Who the fuck are you? Look, I need some help. My friend is hurt really bad and I need to get these goddamn animals out of here.”
“You have a hurt friend?” George asks. “Was he injured by one of the animals?”
“Yes. Look, I told all this to the other guy. What the fuck is going on here?”
George ignores her. “Was your friend attacked by the animals? Was he bitten?”
Julie hangs up. She sits there for a minute, staring at the phone. She picks it back up to call for an ambulance when she sees a figure walk by the backdoor. She only catches a glimpse, but she could have sworn he was wearing green army fatigues. She freezes. There is definitely something fucked up here. She runs into the other room and tries to wake up Jim.
“Jim,” she loudly whispered, shaking him. “Get up, Jim. We need to get out of here.” Jim doesn’t budge. Julie hopes that he has just passed out and isn’t in shock. She sees more people running in the backyard and decides she needs to get out of here. “I’ll call the police and an ambulance for you, Jim. Just hang in there.”
The old house she bought has a trap door in the main room. When the original house was updated with new plumbing, the owners included it just in case they ever needed to do repairs under the house. As soon as she runs into the room with the animals, they all go crazy. They start thrashing and clawing at their cages, trying to get out and, she assumes, at her. Julie doesn’t stop. She runs over to the trapdoor and jumps through it.
Just as she is closing the door, she sees a group of five men dressed in full combat gear kick through the front and back doors in unison. Two of the soldiers, one at the back and one at the front, carry flamethrowers. One of the men grabs Jim and throws him to the ground. Then, without looking, the soldiers unleash hell into her house. They spray streams of fire all around and especially toward the cages. Her first thoughts are about Jim, but then she sees one of the men laying Jim on the ground and placing him in something that looks like a body bag, except with the face exposed so he can breathe. The soldier then fixes a contagion mask with an odd symbol over Jim’s face and carries him out of the house.
The house goes up quickly. There hasn’t been rain in Austin for almost two months and the house and lawn are dried out. The last thing she sees before she closes the trapdoor are the men walking to the cages and spraying streams of fire into each. She hears one man yell that he’s found more animals in the back. Julie’s heart stops. Those animals aren’t sick. They were normal, whatever that meant. She knows those men are going to kill and burn any animal they find in that house. What really strikes her is that the sick animals aren’t freaking out. They just sit in their cages, as if accepting their doom.
She starts to cry, but quickly remembers that she is underneath her house, which she is sure the soldiers intend to burn to the ground. She needs to make a move, but knows they’d be looking for the woman who made the call.
Julie crawls to the far left side of the house. She has a clear path to run straight into the woods. She is about to dart out when she hears one of the men on the radio. “We are neutralizing the problem right now. The majority of the animals here are the house pet varieties. No sir,” he then answers. “There were no large cats or bears found at the site.” The soldier pauses. “Yes sir, we will completely neutralize and cleanse this site. We have a male subject who was bitten by one or several animals. No sir, we haven’t found the one who made the call. We will, sir.”
The soldier motions to the others. “You know our orders,” he says. “Neutralize and cleanse. Nothing living gets outta here.” He then turns to the soldier to his right and says, “Find the female subject who made the call. We need to bring her in.” Then he cups his hands around his mouth and shouts, “Nothing living gets through the perimeter.” As they run into the controlled blaze, the last thing she hears the soldier say is something about the subject at the Austin zoo being neutralized. For the hundredth time today, Julie finds herself asking out loud, “What the fuck is going on?”
With all the soldiers back in the house, she has her chance.
This is it
, she thinks.
I either burn with the house, or get shot running into the woods
.
She takes a deep breath and runs like hell.
Chapter Four
1
Austin Zoo, Austin, TX
I was really hoping I could talk Fi into going home after the incident by the monkey cage, but she is a pretty stubborn girl and won’t even hear of leaving before she gets her train ride and something from the gift shop.
“How about this, sweetie,” I say, trying to bargain with her. “If we leave now, I’ll get you two things from the gift shop.”
“I wanna go on the train.” Her mind is made up. At least the incident hadn’t scared her. I am happy for that.
“Okay, sweetie, but after the train we need to leave.” She is looking at me as if trying to figure out why I want to leave so badly. I don’t want her to be afraid. “Daddy got home from work late last night and is really tired. I figured we could go home, relax, and watch
Dora
on TV.” Fi looks at me the same way her mom does when I’m lying; as if I’m full of shit. I smile, hug her, and we walk to the train.
We make our way around the African Lion and Bengal Tiger cages quickly. It is already 10:50 and the train leaves on the hour. As we walk past the lion cage, I notice that there is only one lion in there.
Fucking hell
.
Why are there so many goddamn animals missing
? Thankfully, Fi is thinking about the train ride and doesn’t notice the absent cats.
After the large cat displays, we dart past the Black Bear cage. The bear has a huge display with a lot of land, a fountain, and some large boulders to climb on. I glance over my shoulder as we walk by and noticed that the bear is also missing. There is another smaller cage up toward the northern end of the display where the zoo volunteers place the bear when they clean the larger display. It’s possible he is in there, but with all the other absent animals, I’m doubtful that’s where he is. Even in that smaller cage, it would be tough not to see him. I stop by the display to read the information. This one is male, weighs five-hundred pounds, and when standing reaches six feet tall. This animal is not one that I want to have a run in with. I just can’t help but think where the hell the bear and all the other missing animals are.
“Come on, Daddy,” Fi whines as she tries to pull me from the bear display. “We’re gonna miss the train.”
“Would I ever miss the train ride?” I ask. Damn. She’s onto me. We leave the missing bear behind and finish the walk to the train. Along the way, we pass display after display of empty enclosures. The bobcats, cougars, and binturongs are all missing. Even the large corral they’ve set up for the petting zoo is looking pretty sparse. They usually have three llamas, a bunch of goats, and six deer, but today I notice only two goats and one deer. I’m starting to wonder if there is some virus or other kind of illness ripping through the animals at the zoo.
We finally get to the train depot with about three minutes to spare. It is getting warmer today. We sit on the bench and wait for the lady to set up the cash register. I reach into Fi’s backpack to grab the water I packed and remember there is a marine-issued combat knife in the pack. I grab the water quickly, thinking everyone might see the knife.
After a minute, we see the train pulling up to the station. We stand in line for our tickets and I can’t help but look around, scanning for anything out of the ordinary.
2
Most days we are two of maybe ten people on the train, but today, with the schools being closed due to a holiday, there are a lot more people around. I do a rough count. About twenty-five to thirty people are in line for the train ride.
As the train comes to a halt, I have to laugh a little bit. As much as Fi loves this train, it is pretty sad looking. The train is a pretty old clunker that looks as though every run is going to be its last. It runs on electricity and therefore has to be recharged every night. The head car, or locomotive, has a raised platform where the driver sits and controls the brake and speed of the train. There are no individual cars either. Instead, there are twenty-one rows of seats with the last row facing backwards. Every four rows of seats make up what would be a car on a larger train. The train is divided up like this, I assume, in order to make going around curves easier.
There’s also a fiberglass ceiling that helps shade the riders from the sun, but there are no sides, so you didn’t feel boxed in. It’s an open design that is very kid-friendly. The seats are small and low to the ground and because there are no doors, it’s easy for a child to climb in and out of the cars by themselves. It’s hard to guess how old the train might be. The faded red paint makes it look pretty ancient, but riding the train is Fi’s favorite part of our daddy-daughter days. In her mind, I’m sure this is a huge locomotive, freshly painted and capable of going across the country.
I look at the people in line before us. They are the typical bunch: some families, a few single parents with their kids, and the random grandparent and grandchild. Standing a few people ahead of us, I notice a young, single woman with no kids in tow. She has sunglasses and a wide-brimmed, floppy hat on. Almost as if she is trying to hide her face, and I swear she faintly smells like smoke. Not cigarette smoke, but almost like she has just ran out of a burning building.
What I don’t notice, at first, is the young man standing about eight people behind us, staring intently at the woman in the floppy hat.
3
I don’t need to ask Fi where she wants to sit, She walks straight to the back of the train. She loves sitting in the last row, the one that faces backwards. She’s told me that when we sit in the last row, she feels like it’s just the two of us all alone on the train. How can you not love a kid that sweet?
Before we sit down, I look at the other families seated on the train and notice the woman in the large floppy hat. She is sitting about three rows away from us, looking like she is anything but interested in this train ride. She catches me looking at her and quickly turned away. I sit down next to Fi and put my arm around her, thinking nothing else of the strange woman.
“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” the conductor says on a microphone. “I’ll be your conductor today and wanted to go over a few safety rules. Please make sure you are sitting down at all times when the train is in motion, and that you keep your hands and feet inside the train at all times. If for some reason the train does stall, please remain in your seats and do not leave the train. It’ll be just another couple of minutes before the brakes are all charged up. Thanks and enjoy the ride.”
I hug Fi closer. I’m glad she wanted to stay. The train ride is our “thing.” I’m hoping that no matter where she goes in life, and no matter how old she gets, she’ll always remember riding the train at the Austin Zoo with her old man.
My thoughts drift back to what happened by the monkey cages. Who was Sean, if that was even his real name? Was he really a domestic terrorist? I seriously doubt it. He looked about as threatening as a Disney character. But then again, it doesn’t take a lot of strength if you have a bomb strapped around your waist. Ideals are always stronger than muscle. Nothing makes sense or adds up about what happened. He seemed more concerned about the animals. Didn’t he even say something about liberating animals?
The even greater question, I think, was why the military was after that guy. Is he an ex-soldier? Is he really more dangerous than he looks? They said they worked for a private security firm. What the hell does that mean? I can’t wrap my mind around it. Nothing about it makes sense. They came storming out of the trees, bound and gagged him, and then stormed off, all with at least twenty witnesses present. The soldiers, though, hadn’t seemed to care.
The loud horn from the train interrupts my thoughts and jars me back to reality. “All aboard,” the train conductor says. I turn to see how many people ended up on the train, and I catch the woman in the floppy hat staring at Fi and me. A shiver unexpectedly runs down my spine.
This is turning out to be one creepy and surreal day
, I think. So far, we’ve seen aggressive animals, unexplained blood in animal cages, seemingly-dead animals that suddenly disappear, and a man being forcefully taken by the military. It suddenly dawns on me how stupid I am being. Why the fuck are we sitting on this train? We should be halfway home by now. I stayed because Fi really wanted to ride the train. That’s stupid. Things aren’t right here today, and as a parent with a shred of common sense, I should have taken her away from this place immediately. So she’d be angry with me for an hour or two. So what? Something is definitely wrong here and I think I’ve realized it too late.
As the train pulls away from the platform, I have a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. “Something’s not right,” I whisper out loud. “Something’s definitely not right.” I look down at Fi. She is kicking her legs and is all smiles.
If there is something wrong
, I think,
there’s no way in hell I’m gonna let anything happen to Fi. No matter what
.
4
Jason sits five rows away from Julie. He is pretty sure she won’t recognize him. They met only that one time when he came by with Sean to “donate” some animals to her shelter. He feels bad about giving her those animals without telling her where they came from. He’s read a few articles on her and knows she is doing great work at that shelter. She never refuses any animal no matter how old or sick it might be and is known to take in just about anything. She was the only choice he and Sean had. He figured the animals in the lab were being fed some kind of steroid or experimental drug and that was why they were so aggressive. In time, he reasoned the drugs would pass through their systems and they’d return to normal. “They just needed to de-tox,” he would say, trying to convince himself.
Jason sits on the train thinking about how he and Sean liberated the animals and had barely escaped with their lives. After the liberation, they’d regrouped at the Animal Rights First office. At first they’d just sat in silence, trying to make sense of what the fuck had just happened. The crushing reality of losing Vicktor and of seeing that soldier blow his brains out of the back of his head had only just started to sink in.
It’s so fucking typical,
Sean had said between sobs.
They pump those poor animals full of God-knows-what, they become violent, and then they send in a crew to kill them all. Fucking assholes.
Dude, I don’t know what they were testing in that lab, but those animals
…
Jason’s sentence had trailed off.
Those animals weren’t right. Did we really save them from those men, or did those men start killing them because we let them out of their cages?
Jason could tell by Sean’s reaction that he hadn’t thought about that.
You mean it wasn’t a coincidence that those guys showed up?
he’d asked.
You think they were there to stop us and when they saw that we had already opened several cages just immediately started killing them to avoid them from escaping?
Jason had started.
Look,
he’d reasoned.
That place had some pretty sophisticated state-of-the-art security, and it was all hidden. It’s almost like they didn’t want people to see just how secure that place really was.
By then, Sean had stopped crying.
I think we set off a silent alarm that was sent directly to that military-looking squad. They didn’t want the police there or else they would have just had a regular alarm hard wired to the police department
.
But … but what were they doing in that lab?
Sean had asked.
How the fuck should I know? You were the one who was working there. Didn’t you see anything?
I saw… I mean… I was there to get…
You got overwhelmed when you saw all those animals in cages and you lost your head. You fucked up, Sean. God only knows what we released into the neighborhood.
Do you think they’re still dangerous?
Are you kidding me? How could you ask that? A fucking monkey took a chunk out of your leg and it sure looked like those animals were chewing their way through the soldiers.
They were scared and were panicking. You said it yourself that they were probably pumped full of steroids or something. Right?
We need to fix this. We need to go see if we can round up any of the animals we set loose. We at least need to round up the cats, dogs, and hamsters. Those are the animals that kids will try to approach.
Sean had grown silent at the mention of kids.
Come on. We have some protective gear. Let’s go round them up. I read about this shelter in Hyde Park that takes in animals, no questions asked.
Sean hadn’t move. Jason had responded by jumping up and hitting his shoulder.
We need to make this right,
he’d yelled.
If any kid gets hurt by one of those animals, I couldn’t live with myself.
They’d picked up a few drinks to calm their nerves and then went around the neighborhood looking for the animals they’d freed hours beforehand. At first they drove around looking for the liberated animals, but realized they were most likely hiding in shadows and cowering under porches and backyard decks. They were about to go back to the office to park the car so they could continue their search on foot when they found them. As they drove by a large field, they noticed in the moonlight that it was littered with bodies. Jason at first thought the worst, and that the animals had attacked and killed a rancher or farmer and a bunch of field workers? Upon closer inspection, they realized the animals themselves were what they saw scattered across the field. Not just some of them.
All
of them. And they looked dead.