Animals

It had been a little over a week since the chimps had arrived at the zoo and the zoo keepers in charge of them seemed to be pretty content with the way they were adjusting to their new home. For a second Penelope thought Rob was going to put her in charge, since he asked her to be present since the moment they arrived, but she was wrong. She asked her boss about it, about why she was never assigned to a specific animal, and the answer she got was that he preferred to have her eye on all the animals even if it was in a smaller amount of time. He wanted her to do what the rest of the keepers couldn’t do when the animals were not in the mood, because animals had no problem with her getting near for some reason.

It was the afternoon of a Thursday and Penny had just finished her classes and had arrived at the zoo to feed the animals. As she did that, as she felt the tension of the day leave her shoulders with mere minutes of being at the zoo, she understood her uneasiness about leaving her current life style and doing something else, like her uncle wanted her to. It was complicated leaving the one thing that made you feel complete and as though you were where you are supposed to be. It was complicated risking that feeling of contentment that filled her at that moment.

Her time at work normally went by faster than she liked and this day was no different, she´d spent the entire afternoon with Lorraine doing rounds on the animals and helping other keepers with certain tasks. She was glad to hear the rumors about Lance had dwindled down, there was no doubt he was a strange man, but she still didn’t think that leaving would be the best thing for him, it was not likely he was going to get a job anywhere else with the temper and strange personality he had. He was probably the one employee she deliberately stayed away from and that had been partly because Ethan had told her to do so.

The day was coming to a close and the visiting hours were over, even though she loved being there, Penny couldn’t help but feel thankful that the day was over as the let a big yawn escape passed her lips. She and Lorraine were just finishing putting some food for the animals that needed to eat more than once a day and the rest of the employees were probably at the employees’ office or heading that way to sign the end of their day.

The sky was pitch black and that made Penelope uneasy. Nighttime was not her favorite part of the day; it had not been for some years even if she used to love it as a kid. When she was a little girl she had always wanted to stay up late to see the sky with the moon and the stars and her mother had always complained about how she had to sleep because she had school the next day. But lately, seeing the darkness that took over the city as the sun left for the day didn’t bring any sort of wonderment or happiness, it just brought a tightness in her chest and a rush of memories she still wished she could forget.

Penelope and Lorraine were walking towards the office when an alarm went off; the sound was so loud and painful that it was impossible not to be immediately worried about what was happening. Both women stopped walking and looked around trying to see something different about the place, but everything was the same. They were completely alone in the middle of the path that lead to the office and they tried to calm down, thinking it was probably a mistake; in all the years Penny had of working at the zoo, the alarm had never gone off.

But the sound persisted and suddenly, Penelope could see why.

“Shit,” she let out in a low voice.

Lorraine turned to her. “What? What is it?”

She was not sure how to say it so that Lorraine wouldn’t freak out and do something stupid, she still didn’t know the depth of the problem and she didn’t want her friend to take off running in the wrong direction. “Um… okay, Lo, don’t freak out, okay?” Lorraine nodded and Penny tried to get some comfort from that even if she knew words at that moment didn’t mean anything. “I think the animals are out of their cages.”

“And what makes you think that?” Lorraine asked keeping her word and not freaking out, yet.

“Because Thomas is right there,” she answered pointing somewhere behind Lo´s shoulder. Lo turned around wishing she was wrong about what she thought that meant, but of course not, of course Penny meant Thomas as in the only male lion in the entire zoo.

The woman´s eyes widened slightly as she tried to remain calm. “Shit.”

Penelope nodded. “Yep, exactly my words.”

The loud alarm was still ringing in the background and that could only mean Rob was aware of what was happening, and also that Thomas was not the only animal out if his cage. In fact, if she played close attention, she could hear some screaming at a long distance, and Penelope could only be glad that the costumers had all already left, that way most people that remained at the zoo were used to being in contact with animals. That is, one animal or two at a time, not several.

“So,” Lorraine was saying interrupting the girl´s thoughts, “if Thomas is right there, still ignoring us thankfully, where is the rest of his herd?”

Lions were some of the big attractions of the zoo, they had always been proud to say they had one beautifully enormous male lion, and four other female lions. All of which were following right after Thomas, Penny could just then see them appearing one by one as Thomas made his way through some of the trees and onto the open path. As soon as he was near them, his amber eyes focused solely on them, and Penny could feel Lorraine start to shake.

“Um, Penny,” she said, her voice clearly trying to hide the fact that she was scared out of her mind, “I know you love animals and whatever, but I think we have to go.”

“Yes we do.” The girl nodded, she shot one quick look at Lo, not wanting to let Thomas out of her sight. “But where?”

Lorraine furrowed her brow. “What do you mean where? Anywhere is better than here!”

Penelope shook her head. “How do you know the other animals didn’t escape too? If we move backwards and they did, we´ll run into the elephants. Do you want to risk that?” It took no time for Lorraine to shake her head.

“Then what do we do?”

“How far is the aviary from here?” Penny asked still not taking her eyes off the lion.

Lorraine shrugged, “Not far.”

Penny turned to her. “And do the cages open electronically o manually?”

“Manually, why?” Lo answered slightly confused.

“Then we go there, start to walk backwards but slowly. I don’t want to scare him,” Penny said and Lorraine couldn’t help but feel that there was no way a full grown lion would be scared to two women.

It took them some time and they moved slow and carefully in case they ran into other animals. It wasn’t certain that the rest of the animals were out of their cages as well, but for Penelope there was no doubt. She was completely sure the animals were out and they only thing her mind could focus on was why this was happening.

The aviary was dark and loud, the birds, too, could feel the rest of the animals were free and they were squawking and cackling so quickly and so loud Penelope almost preferred being out with the lions. Lorraine sat down against one of the walls as she breathed deep, she felt safe there with four walls around her and nothing but animals she knew with her. Penny paced slightly and unconsciously in front of her friend, her fingers were twitching with the anxiety that had taken over her and her eyes were focused on the glass walls of the aviary hoping to see something from the outside.

The painful and loud alarm was still sounding in the distance and in between sounds of that and the birds she could hear some of the other animals, the elephants and the cats that were roaring, the elephants were so close she could feel the ground under her feet shake slightly under the weight of each step they took.

“What are you thinking?” Lorraine asked her.

Penelope turned to see her. “I just don´t understand what´s happening.”

Lo furrowed her brow. “What did you mean by asking if the cages open manually?”

“Well, I don’t know if you know, but there´s a system that controls all doors in case of an emergency,” the girl explained. “It´s electronic and it opens all doors at once if needed, but it´s only supposed to be used by some people. I think that´s why the alarm went off.”

The older woman was surprised but not in a very good way. “Why would they want to open all doors at once?”

The girl shook her head. “It´s not to open them really, it´s to close them. Or to open them in case there´s a fire so the animals’ don´t all die.”

“So you think someone broke in and opened all the doors?” Lorraine asked and Penny could only shrug. “But who? The activists?”

The activists. The activists were a large group of people that were constantly trying to ruin the San Diego zoo in any way they could. They were pacifists and believed the zoo was mistreating the animals by having them captive. Penelope couldn’t say she disagreed much, she always believed animals were better on their own, but there was no one in the whole zoo who mistreated the animals; they were taken care off very good and they lived in such large areas the animals might think they are not captive. However, the activist were always complaining and coming up with stuff of shut the zoo down.

Of course that would never happen; the zoo brought the city too much money just because it was one of the best- if not the best- zoo´s in the world.

Penelope shook her head. “No, I don’t think they´re that stupid. If the activists are even a little bit as smart as they claim to be they would know it would do no good for the animals to be out in the city.”
“So, it was someone from inside the zoo,” Lorraine concluded. She was still sitting on the ground, as if the fear she felt of being surrounded by wild animals was too much for her body to handle.
“An employee?” Penelope asked with furrowed brows. “I don´t think so. Why would they do it? They´d know they´d be endangering all the staff, the animals and even themselves. Who would be so stupid?”

Lorraine shrugged, as if she had known many stupid people in her life that she was no longer surprised by such things. “Maybe it wasn’t about stupidity; maybe someone was angry with the zoo.”

The alarm was still sounding in the background, but the girl could no longer hear the animals outside of the aviary. She could see the night´s sky through the glass walls and she thought Craig was probably wondering where she was. But the last thing she could think of was going home when something so strange was happening in the zoo.

“Angry? But who could be angry enough to do this?” she asked. As soon as the words left her lips, though, she knew the answer herself. “Lance,” she half-whispered.

“I heard rumors about something going on between Lance and Rob, but I didn’t know it was this big.”
Penelope shrugged. “I´m not sure what was happening or why it started, but the other week I was at the office and I would hear them both yelling at each other in his office upstairs, then Lance just came out fuming. But I didn’t think much of it, I mean, the guy´s strange, everyone knows there´s something wrong with him.”

Lorraine nodded her head. She had been working at the zoo longer than Lance and she had never understood why Rob had hired him. “I heard something about Rob firing him.”

“No,” Penny shook her head convinced, “Rob wouldn’t do that, he knows Lance would have a really hard time finding a job somewhere else.”

“Then what was he so upset about?” Lo asked confused. Everyone knew he had been angry for the last few weeks but no one had really thought much of it. Penny shrugged. “Do you really think he´d actually do it?”

It should be a very difficult question; there should be a lot of factors to take into consideration. But in reality Penelope didn’t have to take much time to answer, there was something very weird about Lance; from the way he distanced himself from everyone, to the way he looked at people to the strange mood swings he sometimes had. She would not see it passed him to take such an impulsive decision like that.

“Yeah, I think it was him,” the girl answered. “There´s just no other option, is there?”

Lorraine didn’t answer, instead she stood up and walked closer to the glass walls to see the outside of the aviary, but the night was too dark and there weren’t many lights in the zoo, so there wasn’t much to see. The animals were barely audible at that point, Penelope was sure they were out there, but she could no longer hear them. She could just hear the painful alarm that made her head ache.
“When do you think we´ll be able to leave?” Lo asked worried. She had to get home to her kids and she had many other things to do before the day was over, and being trapped in the zoo was not part of her plan that day.

Penelope pulled out her cellphone. “I don´t know,” she said as she checked the signal of her phone. “We might have to stay to help fix things. I´ll try calling Rob, he must be very busy but maybe he´ll answer.”

Lorraine waited as Penny scrolled down her contact list and called him, she was anxious to leave, but she was also very worried about going out there into the darkness where she was sure wild animals were roaming around. She stared intently at the younger girl as she waited for their boss to answer.

“Penelope, what is it?” Rob asked as soon as he answered. She could hear it in his voice that he was in the midst of taking care of the problem and he didn’t have much time to talk to her.

“Rob, Lorraine and I are at the aviary,” she replied quickly, “we saw some animals and locked ourselves in. What´s going on?”

He heard him sigh roughly. “All the animals escaped when the doors opened, some of them are out in the city but most of them are still here in the zoo.”

“Who-?” she started to ask wanting to know who had opened the doors.

But he didn’t let her state her question. “I need you and Lorraine to leave, quickly; go to your cars in the parking lot, it shouldn’t be a problems even with some of the animals still loose inside the zoo.”
She furrowed her brows. “Really? You don´t need me to stay, you must need a lot of help with what´s happening?”

“No,” he said, “I need to know my employees are safe and out of here. The police are already on their way to handle this. This is a job for them, not you or anybody else of the staff.”

“Are you sure?”

His voice was a little bit calmer when he spoke again. “Yes, I´m sure. Go and come back tomorrow morning, I´ll probably need you then.”

She nodded still worried about what he was going to do to fix what happened. “I´ll see you tomorrow.” As she hung up the phone she turned to Lorraine with a hand still holding her hair up in her head. “He said we should leave now.”

“Are the animals locked up again?” she asked hopeful.

But the serious look in Penny´s face was very clear. “No, they got out.”

Lo made a face not wanting to know the complete explanation to that statement. “Out how?”

“Out! They´re in the city, some of them at least,” the girl answered still shocked by that fact herself.

“Oh, my God.” Lorraine covered her mouth with both hands. “What´s going to happen?”

Penelope shook her head. “I don´t know, but we have to go. Let´s go.”

The expression in Lo´s face said very loudly that she did not want to go out where the animals were, but she knew she could not- should not- stay there, so both girls opened the aviary doors and took a quick look outside to check if it was safe to leave. From that moment until the moment they were in the parking lot things moved too fast; Penelope caught a glimpse of some animals here and there but nothing to be worried about.

The parking lot was deserted and both girls separated as soon as they passed the zoo doors, they said a quick good-bye and then each headed for their cars which were, coincidently, on opposite sides of the enormous parking lot. It would be a lie to say the whole scenery wasn’t a slightly scary one; with the pitch black night and the knowledge that there were lions and tigers and elephants roaming around the city. But Penelope tried to keep her mind clear as she reached her car.
That is, of course, until she heard noises by the large bushes close to her car.

She considered the possibility of not doing anything about it, of ignoring the ruffling of leaves and just drive away. But her conscience held her in place, knowing all the trouble Rob and the zoo would have to go through to get the animals back inside, she could not leave the possibility that there was one so close to reach. She didn’t think much as she walked towards the bushes, in fact, she didn’t think much from that point until she got home sometime later.

The idea that it might be a dangerous animal didn’t leave her mind the whole time as she moved some branches of the bushes to get a good view. But her heart calmed down as she saw the baby chimpanzee quivering in the darkness of the plants. She called him to go to her but he didn’t seem to hear, he was too scared to be able to pay attention. It wasn’t until the police sirens started to sound in the distance, getting closer and closer every second, that the chimpanzee seemed to come back to life and walked rapidly towards Penelope.

She took a hold of him and cradled it like a baby as she thought of what to do, or didn’t really think at all, in her case; because as soon as the red and blue lights came into view and the animals started to tremble faster in her arms she walked towards her car, got inside and placed the chimpanzee on the co-pilot seat. With her eyes straight ahead, the knuckles of her hands white from the pressure she was putting on the wheel, a pounding in her chest and an animal she had no idea why was still with her, Penelope drove away.