Animals Page 4

  “I haven’t been able to teach him to read,” the soldier lamented. “He still can’t bring me an Orange soda when I want one.”

  He was pursuing his PhD. He’d even been in an Ironman competition, completing the swimming portion with just his arms to move him through the water. He’d come in last place but that didn’t matter he said. He had been on the field and he had given it his all. He finished his presentation with the little monkey putting on a Teddy Roosevelt hat and smiling his toothy smile as Sergeant Walker quoted the twenty sixth president.

  “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

  Everyone was inspired by his story and Murray fell in love with the monkey.

  As his testimony wrapped up Murray impatiently waited his turn to speak with the man. A renewed Murray refused to let his father push his chair when they left, he would propel himself. No more feeling sorry for himself, he vowed. His father whispered a silent prayer of gratitude for the wounded vet who finally got through to his son when everyone else had failed. He didn’t mind a bit when he handed over his Visa card to pay for the workout gear Murray picked out at the fitness store.

  Murray had asked his parents about getting a capuchin monkey as a service animal to help him and he’d been working towards it for nearly a year. They had agreed if he got his grades up, if he learned everything there was to know about them and he raised the money himself to buy one. They weren’t cheap.

  He’d buckled down and brought his grades up, that was the easy part. He’d joined Mr. Baynard’s animal studies group to learn about them and had started crafting clever articulated wooden monkeys to sell on Etsy. He had nearly five thousand dollars saved up and soon they could start seriously shopping for one. Murray pumped iron. When the new school year started, he added biology classes to his workload. He held his head up when he rolled down the hallways in his school. He made amends with old friends and added new ones. He owned this chair; it would never own him again. His body ached and his muscles strained from the intensity of his workouts. His skinny arms doubled in size and his belief in himself grew with his muscles.

  His father changed the smooth street tires out for some with off road treads and the dirt paths and gravel trails around the town park became his training course.

  His dream was to take his interest in mechanical engineering and infuse it with the study of starfish and lizards that regenerated their lost or damaged limbs. He would figure out how to apply that to his damaged spine either through biological or mechanical means and get out of this chair. He’d give his advancements to the world, make sure that people like the soldier who’d changed his life would get the chance to be whole again. He’d be like Wolverine, regenerating from traumatic injuries and righting wrongs wherever he found them.

  Moving past the haunted house, he rolled onward to the monkey cages. Piedmont had four of them in residence. They were wonderful animals that never ceased to cheer him up. He envied the way they moved, their speed and agility he could never come close to even if he wasn’t sentenced to life in this wheelchair. Soon he would have one for himself. There were programs that lent the little creatures to incapacitated people but he wanted one of his own, not one he would have to give back whenever they wanted. It was worth the wait, maybe by spring he would have enough money if his sales were good. Who knows, maybe he could get it a little outfit and be an organ grinder, maybe go to children’s hospitals or something. Maybe get a YouTube channel and raise money for charities. The future wasn’t what he’d planned but it didn’t look half bad from where he was sitting.

  He watched them scamper back and forth across the bamboo monkey bars, chittering at each other as they played a game of tag. China, Sage, Elmo and Ernie were nearly everyone’s favorite animals and he knew he wouldn’t have much time to study them before the crowds of little kids showed up.

  He watched them play, long limbs and tails swinging them across the pen and sketched their faces, noting how each was different. They never missed a hand or foothold. Never faltered, the enclosure mapped so thoroughly in their brains they could do it blind. He laughed at their high-speed pursuit and tried to capture some of it with his phone.

  The small simians scampered for the safety of their nest as a scream pierced the air, followed by more screams. Their chatter stopped as they pushed each other in an attempt to get deeper inside to hide in the shadows.

  Murray spun his chair in the direction of the gate. Special effects for the haunted house, he wondered? It made sense, but they were too real, too desperate and pain filled for that he quickly decided.

  Praying it wasn’t one of his friends in danger or hurt, he put his dirt track practice to use and propelled toward the yells and shouts, now joined by the sound of squealing tires and honking horns.

  8

  Donny

  Donny Lin skirted the edges of the park, sticking to the shadows and the less traveled places, avoiding any staff that might have questions for him. He knew he’d been seen a few times, no more than a fleeting glance, but if he wasn’t careful, eventually someone would figure out that he was not paying the gate admission every day. Once the crowds arrived, it was easy to blend in and become invisible. He made his way towards the modern ‘outhouses’ at the back of the park to take care of his morning business. He kept away from the main bathrooms near the gates, too many staff were there and there weren’t enough people yet where he could hide in plain sight. He couldn’t let anyone find out that he was living there because then the authorities would be called. He had a secret spot in the hayloft of the barn in the petting zoo where he could sleep. He had a little niche carved out in the very back and it wouldn’t be discovered until hundreds of bales were used first. He figured he had until early spring before they got to the back of the loft. He wasn’t proud of it but there were storerooms of supplies and no one would miss cans of food or a little fresh meat intended for the animals. There were always plenty of leftover people food too. At the end of the day, the concession stands and little restaurant tossed their unsold food in the dumpster and garbage truck only came twice a week.

  If he had choices, this wasn’t where he would have chosen to be but it was better than being in the foster care system. He was too young to get a job and start living a sort of normal life so he was in a holding pattern for a few more years. He’d been bounced around through the system since he was an infant with no idea where he came from or who he really was. Nobody wanted to adopt the half Asian boy who couldn’t speak. Most people treated him as if he were mentally disabled instead of mute. Nothing could be further from the truth; he’d just never had a chance at being a normal kid. He didn’t know who his father was and all he knew about his mother was that she’d been Chinese.

  There was no way was he ever going back, he’d sleep in a dumpster with the rats before he let another adult sneak in his room late at night like his last foster dad. Being mute and unwanted, he’d always been a target of bullies and perverts looking for an easy victim. The night his foster dad came for him, he had busted his nose with a solid kick, grabbed his few belongings and ran. He drifted through different towns, ate from dumpsters behind restaurants, shop lifted when he had no choice and kept on the move. He was invisible to grownups as long as he didn’t look dirty and they didn’t see him during school hours. He avoided the big cities and the predators that lurked there. He too
k clothes from Goodwill bins, walked into birthday parties at Chuck e Cheeses and ate his fill, paid attention to church billboards and their advertisements of potluck dinners. Winter was coming and he really should be heading south but he liked this place. He’d found it by accident but it had everything he needed. The barn was warm, the food was plentiful and he had the run of the place at night. There were no cameras and the one old man who was the security guard never left the house once he closed the gates.

  He stared at his big toe poking through the worn-out thrift store tennis shoes. He was going to have to ‘borrow’ a bicycle and ride up to the nearest little city to get himself supplied for winter. La Crosse was about thirty miles north and it was big enough to have a few donation boxes around town. He’d never had name brand anything, just cast offs, hand me downs or stuff he took from thrift shop donation boxes. His clothes were worn but clean. He alternated between the two sets he had and washed them in the bathroom sink with hand soap after the park was closed.

  The barn was an ideal spot to hide out during the day where the chances of being caught were almost zero. Once there were a crowd of kids in the petting zoo, he could walk over, make sure no one was looking and disappear into the empty goat stall. From there he could scurry up the ladder and be out of sight in the loft. While he waited, he lay beneath an old elm in the wooded area behind the panther enclosure where he’d spend the morning lounging and reading one of the books he borrowed from the visitor center library. The risk of daytime discovery scared him, but the night was his. He could roam freely, finding leftover food, dropped sunglasses and change in the coin slots of the vending machines. He’d even found an iPod once, but his conscience prevailed and he put it in the lost and found box.

  He’d begun sharing his spoils with the panther who he discovered loved corndogs and hamburgers. He didn’t know what the zoo called the big black cat, but to Donny, he was Yewan, one of the few Chinese words he’d learned. Night in the language of his mothers’ people. The panther, like him, was most active after dark. He’d listened to one of the staff answer questions about him and learned he’d been bred in captivity and had been a family pet until he got too big. One night, with a pounding heart and more than a little fear in him, he’d climbed over the fence with his offering of corndogs. The panther may have looked fierce and vicious but it was just a big kitten. It longed for human touch, it had grown up being cuddled and loved and missed playing and roughhousing. Donny spent most of his nights in the enclosure after that first timid meeting and had taken to bringing his blanket and curling up with him near dawn to sleep together.

  He daydreamed of setting him free and the two of them racing through the night on the hunt, their prey never knowing what hit them until powerful jaws closed around their throat or his spear pierced their heart. Like the panther he was fast and strong. Lean and wiry like a distance runner, he knew together they could rule the forest. Man and beast, tooth, claw and spear, striking fear into the hearts of the lesser animals.

  His fantasy of roaming the jungle with the big cat was interrupted by the screaming from the front gate area. Donny felt panic surge through him. Screaming meant something bad happened, someone could call the police. If they started poking around they might discover him, start asking questions he couldn’t answer even if he wanted to. He considered abandoning his new home, but he finally felt like he had a place to call his. He couldn’t leave, Yewan was the only friend he’d ever had, but he needed to know what was happening. Horns began to honk as people screamed and a strange keening sound filled the air.

  Donny raced along the edge of the wood line to a better vantage point. His eyes widened in disbelief when he saw what was happening at the front gates.

  9

  Main Entrance

  Robert Baynard white knuckled the edges of the sink. The water and aspirin weren’t helping, if anything he felt worse. His head was killing him. He was drenched in sweat and his insides felt twisted up. Uncontrollable rage coursed through him in waves. The bathroom door swung open as a man entered and the sunlight hit the mirror Robert stood facing. He grimaced as the light reflected into his eyes, the pain like white hot daggers and he felt a growl in his throat begging for release. He forced it down and splashed more water on his face.

  “Hey buddy, you don’t look so good,” the man said.

  Robert ignored him.

  “You need some help or something?” the man asked.

  Robert tried to tamp down the rage building inside of him and remained speechless, teeth gritted, once again gripping the edges of the sink as hard as he could.

  A hand touched his shoulder and a concerned voice asked, “You want me to get you some help?”

  Pain flared through his body at the contact and before either man realized what was happening, Robert whipped his head around and bit down savagely on the man’s forearm. He yelled in surprise and pain, shoved Robert away and fled the bathroom. Robert was flung backward, stumbled over his own feet and fell, striking his head on the edge of a urinal. He lost consciousness as the zombie virus continued to course through his veins. Robert Baynard, proud veteran and school teacher, died on a bathroom floor as something new and hungry took control of his body. His eyes shot open, black and lifeless as an uncontrollable need filled him. A need for blood, a need to bite and rend. A need to replicate, duplicate and populate. An insatiable craving for human flesh. He smelled them and heard them only a few feet away and sprang to his feet.

  Kelly stepped into the nurses’ station, concerned over the prospect of a guest being bitten by an animal. It was shaping up to be one hell of a day. They were short staffed, most of the crew had called in sick. There were already lines forming at the gates as families and tour groups took advantage of the nice weather before the days grew cold. And now this. It wasn’t unheard of for some of the animals to get a little rowdy, but nothing had ever warranted the panic she’d heard on the radio.

  The nurse’s station was near the main entrance near the visitors’ center. This area consisted mostly of park benches, the snack bar, gift shop and a playground for the kids. The closest creatures were the barnyard animals in the farm display that doubled as a petting zoo. There were a few goats, the chickens, a pair of cows, some free roaming peacocks and an old alpaca. They’d never had any trouble from any of them.

  Although, it could be one of the capuchins, she thought. The little monkeys occasionally darted out of their enclosure if a handler was careless and would start begging or stealing junk food from the guests. Along with their wallets, watches, earrings or any other thing they could get their paws on.

  A burly man sat on the edge of the examination table. Blood dotted his t-shirt and jeans. Anna held a compression bandage to the wound on his arm, a tube of antibiotic cream in her free hand.

  Kelly bustled in, washed her hands and approached the man who was trying to be cavalier about the whole thing and maybe do a little flirting with the pretty aide.

  “Sir, may I see?” asked Kelly.

  He nodded and massaged his forehead with his free hand. Sweat ran freely from under the bill of his John Deere cap. He was in a lot of pain, much more than a simple bite would cause, and was starting to have trouble maintaining his air of nonchalance.

  Anna pulled the bandage away and he drew his breath in sharply at the pain. Black streaks were spreading outwards from the bite mark. A huge chunk of flesh was missing, the human teeth impressions plainly evident.

  “How did this happen?” Kelly asked as she studied the wound. “Was there an altercation?”

  “I guess,” the man said. “I was just trying to help. Some guy in the bathroom looked sick, he was sweating and looked like he was about to throw up. I was just trying to see if he was okay and the jerk bit me.”

  “We’ll dress this for now but you need to get to the emergency room and have a doctor look at it.” Kelly said. “We’ll call you an ambulance, this really needs to be examined.”

  Anna shook her head and tried to conve
y something without the man seeing as he agreed, his good humor fading fast as the waves of pain became worse.

  She had the man lie down on the examination table as she dressed the wound then pulled Anna aside so they wouldn’t be overheard.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I’ve tried contacting EMS, the Sheriff and the fire department.” Anna said barely above a whisper. “No one is answering. I think this might be serious. I think the biter might be carrying the virus that’s been all over the news.”

  “I thought that was only in the big cities.” Kelly said. “And they’re not sure what it is, Anna. Some are saying it’s just opportunists taking advantage of the situation and starting riots so they can loot.”

  “Well, that’s no ordinary bite. It’s moving too fast, Kelly. It only happened a few minutes ago and he’s already feverish. You saw those black strands of infection spreading away from the wound. I’ve never seen anything like it.”