Chapter 14
The giant African elephant dominated the cavernous central hall. Though it was illuminated only by hidden lights beneath and beyond it, its shadow filled the entire rest of the room. Red exit lights glowed above several open doorways.
“We’re in deep now,” said Jack.
“What do we do?” asked Quinn.
The boys walked as quietly as they could, toward the ring of columns that separated the wide open central space from the circular promenade surrounding it. Their footsteps resounded. The guards’ station was empty. There were no sounds in the hall.
“Is this a trick, do you think?” asked Quinn.
“I think this is what we were hoping for, isn’t it?” said Cable, “access to the animals without people around.”
“So you think this mean Otis is helping us?”
Cable nodded. Jack did not. They skirted the edge of the room, listening for sounds. It wasn’t clear whether, in a room that size, a small sound would seem big or if it would disappear entirely, swallowed up by the open space.
After tip toeing along from one column to the next without making any decisions, Jack finally strode out into the middle of the room. “Hello!” he shouted. “Hello! Is anyone here? We’ve been locked in!”
His voice rose to the high dome and did not bounce back down.
“Hello!” he shouted again. “Is there any way out of here?”
Silence.
“You don’t think there’s a guard or something?” asked Quinn.
“If there is, chances are we’ll show up on camera too. Might as well make it look like it was a n accident.”
“I can’t believe everyone cleared out of here so fast. How long were we downstairs?” asked Cable.
Jack headed for the Mammal Hall. “Let’s do this,” he said
His brother followed. The mammal hall was dimly lit, with lights embedded in the ground to prevent people from walking into the displays. The boys looked up at the lion and then decided to examine the tiger first, since it was at ground level. But as they were about to leave the main path and cross the mirrored surface of the drinking hole, Quinn noticed a ladder on its side by one of the benches. He called his brothers attention to it. When they investigated, the also found a flashlight.
“Otis?” asked Cable.
“Had to be,” said Jack.
They set up the ladder beneath the pedestal with the lion. Cable climbed up and Jack handed him the flashlight. Cable switched the light on and pointed it at the lion. Up close, it still seemed lifelike. The face was molded from an epoxy of some sort. Cable extended a nervous hand and touched the mane. It was soft, much more like a real cat than he had anticipated. The epoxy that made up the face was scratchy, as though it had been mixed with sand. Only the tiny details, the whiskers on the face, the nose and lips resembled anything man-made. The teeth were ferociously real and the eyes, for all the world, seemed genuine as well. Cable was also struck by the incredible size of the animal. It came up to his chest, or would have if they’d been standing on level ground. As it was, with Cable on the ladder, it loomed much higher. And it was longer than it was tall. Its rear legs rippled with muscle. Cable suppressed a shiver, as he forced himself to concentrate on its face. He touched the eye. It was cool and smooth.
“It feels like it’s just a marble,” said Cable.
“Is it loose?” asked Jack, from the base of the ladder.
Cable touched the eye a little harder. It was set firmly in place. He tried to pinch it between thumb and forefinger, but the eyelids got in the way. He could not get a grip.
“It feels pretty well stuck in there,” he rported.
“Try the other one,” said Jack.
Cable did, with the same result.
“Can you peel back the eyelid?” asked Jack, “like Otis mentioned, from his note?”
Cable was able to pinch the top eyelid, but it was made of the same scratchy epoxy as the rest of the face. It was not flexible.
“What about the sides?” asked Jack, “could we stick a pencil or a key in there and maybe get some leverage?”
Cable looked down, shining the light on his brother, “be my guest,” he said, “come on up here.”
Jack climbed the back side of the A-frame ladder until he was even with Cable. He too was taken aback by the lion, up close. But he mastered himself and reached into his pocket for a pen. The ball point tapped against the glass eye. Cable shone the light and Jack looked for some clue that would indicate that Souvlakis might have left. But he could not find anything except an expertly sculpted face.
“I can’t find anything,” Jack finally admitted.
Cable shone the light around the rest of the room. Quinn was squatting on the mirror looking at the Tiger.
“Anything?” called Cable.
Quinn shook his head.
“What about the bear?” asked Cable, shining the light at the polar bear, reared up on its back legs and glowering at the distant seal pup.
“It’s the only one that doesn’t have an I in its name,” said Quinn.
“What’s that?” asked Cable.
“Lion, Tiger, Bear,” said Quinn. “That’s what the note said. Bear is the only one with no I.”
“So what?” said Jack bluntly as he hopped down from the ladder.
“Dunno,” said Quinn, “I’m just saying.
Cable came down the ladder as well. “We might as well look. It’s the only one we haven’t examined.”
They dragged the ladder over to the bear. Cable started up the steps, but dropped the flashlight. While he was getting it, Jack jumped onto the ladder and climbed up the bear’s eye level. Cable stepped up next to him, with the light.
“Well?” asked Quinn.
“Looks the same,” said Jack.
Cable probed the left eye, then the right. The face was modeled out of the same epoxy but this time it was shiny black and smooth.
“What’s that?” asked Jack. He reached towards a discolored fleck on the surface of one of the eyes. Shifting his weight made the ladder rock slightly; one of its legs was on a slight rise in the contoured floor.
“Whoa there,” said Cable, as the ladder wobbled. Cable grabbed onto the top of the ladder to catch his balance.
“Give me the light a second,” said Jack.
Cable handed him the flashlight, not quite ready to lean back out away from the ladder yet. Jack shone it on the bear’s eye.
“There’s something here,” said Jack. He held the light at an angle and tapped the eye with his other hand.
“What is it?” said Cable. He leaned out.
The ladder shifted again. Jack grabbed for the ladder with the hand that held the flashlight. With the other hand he accidentally jabbed the bear’s eye. The ladder had only shifted a fraction of an inch again. Both boys caught their balance. When Jack steadied the light again and shone it at the bear’s face, he saw that the eye had moved.
“That’s it!” exclaimed Cable.
“What?” called Quinn from across the hall, where he was looking up close at a wolf.
“It’s a button or something,” said Cable.
Jack held the light steady and poked at the eye again. This time it clicked back and in like a button. Then, in a split second, both eyes of the bear flashed with a series of bright strobe lights which were accompanied by the unmistakable sound of a camera snapping a series of photographs. Then, while both boys were still seeing stars from the bright light that had flashed in their faces, from the bears mouth there came a blast of liquid. It was like a hose has been unleashed on them at full blast. It lasted only a second and then it stopped. The insides of their noses burned with a familiar and acrid smell. The flashlight clattered to the ground.
“Oh my god!” shouted Quinn.
Jack and Cable both shrieked and fell from the ladder, holding their faces in their hands.
“Oh my god!” shouted Quinn again, “Jack, Cable!” He raced towards them. His eyes had not yet recovered form the blast of strobe lights either, but what he thought he had seen, and what replayed in his mind’s eye as he dashed to their aid, was a sudden blast from the bear’s mouth, and then both of his brothers fell to the ground, their entire faces and fronts covered with a dark liquid.
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