Animal Kingdom

by Iain Rob Wright

  Grace didn’t say anything. She yanked the mop from the bucket and ran at Joe and Victor. For a second Joe thought she was about to brain one of them, but instead she shoved the wooden pole up against the door.

  Joe realised what she was doing and watched in admiration as Grace threaded the pole behind the handle, twisting it so that both ends wedged against the door’s frame on the left and right. Hesitantly, Joe released his grip on the door handle. It moved slightly, and for a split-second it looked like the plan might fail, but then the handle caught against the pole.

  It held.

  Joe shook his crippled hand, trying to get some feeling back into it. The knuckles ached as he flexed them. “Good thinking. I don’t think I could have held on much longer.”

  Danny put his arm around her. “You’re smart and pretty like Miss Elizabeth.”

  Grace raised her eyebrows at Joe.

  Joe laughed. “She was a very famous lady in wrestling. It’s a big compliment in Danny’s world.”

  Grace knelt down and gave Danny a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you!”

  Danny rubbed at the spot where she had kissed him and pulled a face. “Keep your lips to yourself, lady.”

  Joe was surprised to see everyone laugh at this, even Victor and Randall – although something about Randall’s expression seemed a little forced.

  The banging and scratching on the office door suddenly stopped.

  “Perhaps they’re giving up,” Grace suggested.

  Joe nodded. “Perhaps. Or maybe they’re moving on to plan B.”

  “Plan B?” said Grace.

  Joe nodded. “Something tells me that things are just getting started.”

  “All the more reason to commence with our plans,” Randall said. “We need to get moving, my friends. The quicker we can hunker down, the safer we’ll be.”

  Everyone agreed. They had to do something proactive instead of waiting for the next attack. Joe had to keep his son safe no matter what. “I’ll go look for the litter pickers in the warehouse,” he said. “Grace, will you and Danny come with me?”

  “Of course. I think I may have even seen where they were earlier.”

  “Excellent,” said Randall. “I, and the rest of us, will gather supplies into the seminar room.”

  With the lack of any argument, the group got moving. Joe, Grace, and Danny re-entered the supervisor walkway of the warehouse. Joe leaned over the safety rail and looked down over the various pallets on the floor below. “It’s a bit of a maze down there.”

  “I know, but I think I saw the litter pickers over by the delivery shutter on the far wall.”

  Joe took his son by the hand. “Let’s go down and get them then. Danny you stick close to Daddy, okay?”

  Danny nodded and squeezed Joe’s hand tight.

  At the bottom of the steel staircase the warehouse seemed even more like a maze. Joe examined the first stack of pallets in front of him. It was full of cleaning products and housekeeping chemicals. It wasn’t what he was looking for right now but Joe made a mental note of the various bleaches and the FLAMMABLE signs that adorned their bottles.

  Grace stood behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Anything?”

  “I don’t think so. Let’s keep going.”

  The three of them moved on through the warehouse, cataloguing useful items such as a pallet of canned cafeteria food and a small supply of petrol, while disregarding un-useful items such as a crate of plastic animal souvenirs, although Joe did allow Danny to take a Rhinoceros from the pile.

  Grace pointed. “I think they’re over there.”

  Joe looked across the warehouse and saw a collection of metal rods stacked up against a steel shutter door. He walked over and grabbed one of them. After examining it he saw that it was indeed a spike-tipped litter picker. “Great,” he said, thumbing the points. “These will come in handy.”

  “How many are there?” Grace asked. “There’re seven of us.”

  Joe sighed. “Only three, but it’s a start.”

  “Sure is. Hopefully we won’t need any of them.”

  Joe handed one of the spikes to her. “Better to be safe than sorry.”

  Grace looked at the tip of the spike in her hand and suddenly began to well up with tears. She wiped at her cheeks with her free hand. “I’m sorry.”

  Joe put down the litter pickers and put his arms around her. “It’s okay. We’ll be fine. Whatever has caused this may well end soon. We don’t know what’s going to happen yet.”

  Grace squeezed into him, pulling Danny into the hug also. “I’m so frightened. Things haven’t even sunk in yet, and I already feel like I’m going to have a breakdown. I saw people die today and I’m scared. Not just of the animals either.”

  Danny was now crying also and Joe felt himself wanting to join them. He couldn’t allow himself to though, because he needed to be calm for his son – maybe for Grace too. “I’ll look after you both,” he said, hoping he was strong enough for it to be the truth. “We just need to stick together until all this is all over.”

  Grace pulled away and looked at Joe. Her eyes were red. “What if it’s never over?”

  Joe thought about it and didn’t like what came. If the situation went on permanently then what hope was there? “I don’t know,” he eventually said. “We just have to be ready. Ready for whatever comes. Right now that means arming ourselves to the teeth.”

  Grace laughed and wiped at her face. “I guess we better keep searching then.”

  Joe grabbed the litter pickers back up and held them out like spears. “And if you see anything with fur, stab it!”

  “Don’t worry,” said Grace. “I’ve given up being an animal lover. Time to bring out my inner-caveman.”

  A deep, bass-filled bellow shook the warehouse and the three of them spun around with a start.

  Standing -several feet away, poking out from behind a stack of spare plastic seating, was a massive alligator, stretching its head into the air and raising itself up, as if to show as much of its body as possible. With another almighty bellow, the creature lowered back down and stared at them with its ancient eyes. Then it hissed.

  Grace moved up against Joe so that they were touching. “This thing doesn’t have any fur, should I still stab it?”

  Joe nodded. “I think it qualifies as something we should stab, yes.”

  The alligator came at them without warning, moving surprisingly quick for such a heavy animal. Its head swished back and forth as it charged them, jaws open, ready to taste human flesh.

  “Get upstairs!” said Joe. “I’ll deal with this!”

  Grace shook her head. “No way. We should all just run for it.”

  “We can’t abandon these supplies. We’ve got no chance without them. Plus we need to find out how this thing got inside or else we’ll have the whole zoo in here before long.”

  Grace hesitated, but as the alligator got closer she was forced into action. She ran, taking Danny with her, and leaving Joe alone.

  Joe sprinted away too, but further into the warehouse instead of towards the stairs. “Come get me you sad-excuse for a crocodile.”

  The animal turned and followed Joe. He could hear it hissing and grunting behind him. He had no idea what he planned to do, but he was confident of outrunning the creature that was built more for water than for land. For how long, however, he did not know.

  Joe stopped and spun around, litter spike in hand. The alligator was gone from sight, still somewhere close if the sound of its angered breathing was anything to go by, but not anywhere that Joe could see.

  “Hey there, alligator, where ya hiding?”

  As if in answer to his question, the alligator lunged out from behind a tower of boxes, taking Joe by surprise. The giant lizard crashed down on top of him, as heavy as a car. All of the wind was crushed out of Joe’s lungs and stars clouded his vision. The only sense still operating coherently was his smell, which was picking up the fetid scent of half-digested flesh coming from the
creature’s mouth.

  Joe thought fast as the alligator wrestled to keep him pinned It was trying to position itself enough to get a clear bite at him. He instinctively pushed at the beast’s bottom jaw with all his might. Thoughts of evenings alone, watching the Discovery Channel, suddenly entered Joe’s mind and spurned him into action. In a bear hug, he wrapped his arms around the alligator’s jaws, clamping them shut. Joe remembered that the muscles used to snap an alligator’s jaws closed were exceptionally strong, but the ones that opened them were very weak. Joe held on for dear life, keeping the deadly maw closed.

  It wouldn’t keep him safe for long. The crushing weight of the alligator was still immovable on top of Joe, and although he was strong enough to hold its jaws closed, eventually his stamina would give out and his arms would fail. He was doomed, already dead.

  His arms were already weakening, their strength ebbing away…

  The beast thrashed on top of him, fighting back against the grip around its jaws. Slowly but surely, the jaws began to open and Joe’s arms began to part.

  No more strength left, Joe released his grip. He spat in the alligator’s face and laughed. “I hope I give you the shits!”

  Clenching shut his eyelids, Joe waited for a death grip around his throat.

  But none came.

  Instead he opened his eyes to find Grace standing over him. She had driven her litter picker into the skull of the alligator and was twisting violently in order to penetrate deeper through the creature’s thick armour.

  Without thinking, acting entirely on instinct, Joe reached out to his side and managed to grasp his own litter spike that lay nearby on the ground. He pulled the weapon toward him, angled it towards the soft flesh of the alligator’s underside. Then he thrust with all his might.

  The litter spike went all the way through the creature’s head, poking out the top of its eye socket like a horn. After several frantic convulsions, the creature flopped forward and went still.

  From beneath the animal’s bleeding corpse, Joe looked up at Grace. “You fancy making a handbag, or some shoes maybe?”

  Grace was pale and shaken. “I’m more of man-made kind of gal. Now stop messing around under there and get up, will ya! We need to get this place secure.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Things are looking up, thought Randall. They’d managed to find several full water coolers as well as a pack of cola cans in a mini fridge. Victor and Bill had found several heavy-duty office printers and dragged them downstairs to reinforce the barricade. Most of the windows on the upper floor had been blocked by upturned tables and filing cabinets, while the remaining furniture had been piled up into the corridor at one end to stop anything getting through if the downstairs barricade was breached. All in all Randall was quite pleased with the last hour’s work. They would all be safe and his organisational skills were to thank for it.

  These people owe me.

  “That’s it, Shirley,” he said. “Just put whatever useful items you’ve found into a pile over on that table.”

  “Things are quite secure now,” said Shirley, placing down a half-empty bottle of Evian amongst the other supplies. “I’m impressed that you’ve gotten things so well in hand.”

  “Thank you, Shirley. We can’t afford to lose our heads in situations like this now, can we?”

  “Not at all. It’s good to see that we have such a strong man leading us.”

  Leading? Randall liked the sound of that. Shirley was obviously an astute woman that recognised his superiority amongst the group. “Thank you,” he said again. “It’s just a shame that this all occurred on a Saturday morning – we could have done with extra bodies. Still, I will make absolutely sure that those that are here get through this safely and in one piece.”

  “I know you will, Mr Randall. I can see God’s strength guiding you and I have every faith that your determination will see us through.

  God’s strength? What are you talking about, you senile old bat? There’s no god here. You’re better off putting your faith in me.

  Randall grinned. “Well, I am glad to have the support of a fine woman such as yourself. If you’ll excuse me for a moment.”

  Shirley left him alone and Randall moved off into the corner of the room. From inside his pocket he pulled out his Blackberry and then turned away from everyone. There were no emails or messages and Randall cursed under his breath. If he didn’t get in touch with the outside world soon he was going to blow a fuse. He needed to know what was being done to rectify this situation, but there was nothing coming through, and his attempts to call out had failed. He’d also tried several of the computers in the various offices, but none of them had an active Internet connection any more. Communications were well and truly down it seemed.

  But he still had to keep trying. The more he knew, the better he could take charge of the situation. Like they say, knowledge is power.

  Randall switched off his phone to save the battery then put it away. He turned around and approached Victor who was inventorying their supplies. “How are things looking?”

  Victor folded his arms and shrugged. “Not too bad. We’re good for water, but don’t have much food besides the odds-and-ends we found in the offices. All of the snack machines are downstairs.”

  “Perhaps Joe and Grace will find something in the warehouse. Didn’t Mason say there are cafeteria supplies there?”

  Victor nodded. “Mason just left for the warehouse to go and help them find their way around. They should all be back soon.”

  “Okay. If they manage to find any food, I want you in charge of it. We need to ration.”

  Victor grinned. “Would be my pleasure. Do you not trust that everyone will share?”

  “No I don’t. If it’s one thing I know about people, it’s that they are incapable of governing themselves.”

  “Fair enough. You can leave things safe with me.”

  Randall left the Scotsman alone with the inventory and approached the next person in the room, Bill. The aging Black man was busy piling up makeshift weaponry. Randall looked over the collected items. “Don’t happen to have a shotgun hidden there, do you?”

  Bill laughed. “I wish. All I could find was stationary. There’re some metal metre-rulers which could break a few bones, but not against anything big. A blade from a paper guillotine was probably the most lethal thing I could find, although it’s a bit clumsy. There was this in one of the labs though.” He held up a large container full of clear liquid. “Sulphuric acid. If I remember high school chemistry well enough then I think this stuff is pretty lethal.”

  Randall smiled. “It certainly is. In fact my company owns a manufacture that produces chemicals just like it. I’m sure it will come in handy.”

  Bill went back to what he was doing and Randall exited the room, closing the door behind him. The corridor was empty, other than the large stack of office furniture piled up at one end. Two doors down was a room marked: TODD SPETCHLEY, HEAD OF PRIMATE CARE. Randall entered the room and stepped inside. The space was mostly empty now, its furniture removed for the barricade. Some things still remained however: a desk too wide to get out of the door and a steel filing cabinet that was fastened to the rear wall by several bolts. Randall took a key from his pocket and unlocked the cabinet.

  He’d found the key earlier still in its lock. Inside the cabinet he had found several bags of crisps and a chocolate bar amongst the useless paperwork and files. He had cleared out the cabinet earlier and replaced the contents with supplies. It now contained several bottles of water and some additional snacks that had been in various drawers and cupboards. There was also a scalpel from the laboratory as well, just in case he needed to defend himself. There were many other things inside, but not everything in the cupboard had an obvious use just yet. The way he saw it was that the more he had available, the more options he would have later.

  Randall placed his Blackberry inside. It wouldn’t do to be caught with it on his person after he had declined to declar
e it. He would return to it later and try to gain contact with somebody outside of the zoo. Somebody had to be doing something.

  After locking the cabinet up again and pocketing the key, Randall re-entered the corridor and immediately bumped into Joe’s group. “Oh, hello, everyone. How did it go in the warehouse?”

  Mason was smiling. “Very well, as it happens. Fortunately, a delivery for the cafeteria came in this very morning, right before things became…inconvenient. There is enough food to last us for a while.”

  The little boy, Danny, spoke up next. “We found weapons too, and an alligator!”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah,” said the boy’s father, Joe. “We found the litter spikes, and Mason found us some gardening equipment when he came down to help; shovels, pitchforks, and stuff. As for the alligator…it’s all dealt with. We managed to kill it. It got in through an open side-door in the warehouse, but we closed it up and blocked it.”

  “Excellent. I’m just glad you’re all okay. Perhaps when this is all done, you can get on one of those shows where they wrestle alligators all the time.” Randall laughed, pleased with hi banter. “Victor and the rest of us managed to secure the floor quite well so it looks like we’re in good shape. It’s getting dark outside so it may be a good time to bed down soon.”

  “Do we have any blankets?” Grace asked.

  Randall shook his head. “Not really. There’re a few cushions and some lab coats to lie on, but other than that we’re in for an uncomfortable night in the cold.”

  Joe shrugged. “We’ll manage. Things could be worse.”

  The lights cut out.

  Joe looked up at the ceiling. “You’re kidding me.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  The entire group helped bring food up from the warehouse, leaving about a third behind in case something happened to the main supply. They had filled up the seminar room with goods and were now piling cushions onto the floor. It was almost full dark outside and no stars were shining. They didn’t have much time left until visibility was next to nothing.