ZooFall

by Lawrence Ambrose

  "Thirty of your days for what you would call a 'beta' version. Six months for full pattern activation."

  "And we'll need safe passage out of here," said Diana. "A lot of angry creatures are waiting outside the no-fight zone."

  "Done," said Aziz. "But fair warning: my intervention in this or any Life Center world violates Keeper protocol. This is likely to be a one-time exception. I will extend a safe zone for you ten kilometers beyond this Life Center. Beyond that, you're on your own. In order to survive, you will need to continue the same practices which have kept you alive to this point."

  No one spoke for a few moments before Gunnar cleared his throat.

  "We can live with that," he said.

  Chapter 20

  THE KEEPER AI WAS good to his word. The Nazrene/Azrene were nowhere in evidence when they emerged from the Hub/Life Center. Aziz had explained that it could manipulate the behavior of any Life Center "registrant" – zoo animal – on a spectrum from mere impelling via hormones, emotions, subliminal suggestion to complete compulsion by hijacking the animal's mind. In general, that power was not exercised. A large part of the appeal to the zoo's customers was the naturalness of animal's behaviors and their habitat. Summoning them to the Life Centers – Aziz revealed they numbered fifty-two thousand and were placed all over the world, land, and sea – had been a rare exception for the dual purpose of conditioning the animals to the centers for possible future transport and making them available for customer-viewing in their native habitats.

  The Keepers and Aziz – it was not clear whether Aziz was merely permitted to make "executive decisions" or for all intents and purposes ruled over its biological constituents – were not especially interested in creating wildlife sanctuaries. In fact, Aziz had suggested that stays in the Life Center might be forcibly limited depending on various factors, including "client preference." While that was uncertain, the appearance of aliens on their world and within the Life Centers – to "observe, hunt, or experience other interactions"– was a done deal. Aziz had assured them that alien vacationers/hunters would not be permitted to employ any technology, including weapons, beyond the highest level currently present on this world, against "the residents".

  It turned out that their guns represented that "highest level." Any technology beyond that could be used for observation only.

  Everyone wondered just how reassured they ought to be by those provisos. When Myth told Jizibex what had been said, she assured her that the god had greatly honored them with its visitation and that it would never lie. Myth's attempt to explain what Aziz and the Keepers truly were fell on deaf and/or uncomprehending ears.

  Outside the Hub, there was some debate among the group about where they should settle or whether they even should stick together. Everyone's first impulse was to return to their homes in or near Glenwald, but when Diana and Gunnar questioned the logic of that, pointing out that they probably wanted to stay not too far from the Hub – anticipating the recovery of their world's patterns, despite their skepticism about what that would truly mean – and that the location of their homes didn't satisfy the dictates of a mutual defense community. Even if they returned to Glenwald, if they cared about mutual defense, which they all did, then they'd have to relocate. So, for now, why not start afresh and adopt a group of homes in one of the many upscale communities in the area? They could always return to their former haunts in the future.

  That decided, they followed Dan and Sonja's recommendation ten miles north to an upscale resort on a lake they'd splurged on for a two-week vacation last summer: Twin Cities Retreat. They assured everyone that the cabins were spacious and well-constructed, the lake was clean and full of fish, and grills both private and public abounded. The resort would offer an endless supply of water and food, cabins that were close enough for defense but not too close for privacy, along with a nice sandy beach and a resort store that would likely furnish all their fishing needs and perhaps a few incidental food items. The place had a side-business for curing meat on one end of the property – they sold their own brands of jerky in the resort store –which Dan thought could come in handy. In the past, they'd even had a large garden and some beehives from which they harvested honey and vegetables that were also sold in the resort store.

  "Count me in," said Gunnar. "I always wanted a place on a lake."

  "Sounds like a plan," said Diana.

  "Hell, yeah," Gary chimed in. "I could use me some fresh fish. These land animals are getting boring."

  "Do they have boats?" Penny asked.

  "Plenty of boats," Dan assured her. "They even have bicycles that ride on the water."

  "That sounds like fun!"

  Along the way, they picked up some unexpected fellow travelers. First, the shadow of a familiar silhouette overhead presaged the arrival of an old airborne friend. When Zurzay dropped down in front of her, Diana was surprised how fast her vision blurred with tears.

  "Zurzay!" Penny cried, rushing toward him, a grumbling Curly at her side.

  The big winged-wolf accepted Penny's charge with a distracted pat on her back while the grey-blue wolf-dog bristled nearby.

  "Oh, don't be jealous, Curly! He's just one of our friends."

  Diana comported herself with more adult reserve, approaching her hirsute friend with an outstretched hand that he clasped with gentle restraint. Oh, who am I kidding?

  Apparently not Zurzay, since he shook off her hand and gathered her in with enough force that her neck vertebrae crackled when her face impacted his furry chest. Soft fur, she thought dazedly, but hard muscle and bone.

  "Did you make your connection, Romeo?" she asked just above a whisper. "Get it out of your system? Or is this just a visit?"

  The big beast held her with a firmness that made her think he wouldn't be going anywhere soon.

  They encountered their second traveling companions a few more miles from the Hub: Gary's Stone Age tribe, which, it seemed, had been tracking them since they'd departed the "Life Center." Twiggy broke from the clan and ran up to Gary with a joyous grin – and Jizibex lunged toward her with teeth bared and all claws in slice and dice mode. Gary barely moved fast enough to interpose himself, picking up a few lacerations on his arms as she shoved the furious, hissing Azrene back. He held up a severe warning finger when she made the mouth-sucking, sinus-clearing sounds presaging a stream of toxic spit.

  "Now listen up, Jiz!" he growled. "I hauled your hairy monkey ass down twice from those damn towers! You know what that means? Your hairy chimp ass is mine!"

  The Azrene turned from him to Myth, her death-dealing expression turning to question. "What does my bond-mate say?"

  "He says that as my greatly honored bond-mate you must acknowledge his leadership," Myth stated smoothly. "He says that while you may not understand his customs that you must nonetheless respect them. Just as he must respect the obligation he has to this girl and her people."

  "What obligation, and how did he incur it?"

  "She helped save his life, much as he saved yours, if my knowledge is correct."

  "The hairless skin female saved his life?" Azrene scowled at the Neanderthal girl, her rage displaced by a profound resignation. "Then honor would require he respect their bond."

  "That is how he sees it."

  With a deeply weary exhalation, Jizibex retreated to join the others, while Gary gave Twiggy a chaste hug and waved for her and her people to join them in their journey – an offer to which their leader and Twiggy's probable father appeared to nod his acceptance.

  "Gary," said Diana, falling back to walk with him for a moment. "Could I ask you to do something?"

  "Sure, D. Whatever I can do."

  "Would you mind shortening your Azrene's name to 'Bex' instead of 'Jiz'? As a personal favor?"

  "Uh..." His puzzled frown turned to a comprehending grin. "Oh. Heh. Right. No problem, Diana. Bex sounds better anyway."

  "That's what I was thinking."

  LIFE, DIANA thought, was surprisingly grand at the "Twin
Cities Commune," as Gunnar had dubbed it. Food and water were plentiful, the long, sandy beach and pristine blue lake were easy on the eyes and spirit, and they lived relatively unmolested by zoo creatures, which had withdrawn from the immediate area after being made to feel extremely unwelcome on a couple of occasions. They'd added weapons and ammunition and miscellaneous goods from a nearby Walmart, brought in medical supplies from a hospital twenty miles distant and located several vegetable gardens in the area in addition to the resort's. Everyone performed basic chores such as hunting, fishing, and harvesting and canning vegetables and fruit – Sonja and Laurie both having some expertise in canning which the rest of them lacked – but there was also an unaccustomed amount of free time. A near-playful atmosphere prevailed, which would've been unthinkable a mere month ago.

  The Neanderthal tribe had settled in along the shore as well, in a thick grove of oak and pine trees just beyond the resort's large garden. Relations between the modern humans and the tribe were amicable but sometimes awkward. Misunderstandings rose over personal space and sanitation – one unpleasant moment centered around a growing pile of tribal excrement on one end of the resort's beach – led to ongoing attempts to communicate and negotiate grievances which were often frustrating to both parties.

  Ironically, Gary, hardly known for his charm or diplomacy, became a kind of ambassador between both groups. Gary, who'd shacked up with Jizibex in one of the smaller, cozier cabins, sharing a love that no one dared – or could quite stomach – to name, spent time in both camps, getting to know the tribe's people and language.

  A final touch on the Disney-like vibe that had settled in at the resort was the arrival of the dragon formerly known as "Spike" with her two babies, prompting Laurie to immediately rename her "Lucy" after her maternal grandmother. It was Laurie who'd first spotted her drinking at the far shore of the small lake and had begun shouting and waving excitedly on the chance that it was her dragon. Lucy had quickly confirmed that she was by flying straight across the water onto their beach with her two children and landing at Laurie's feet. Everyone headed down to the beach – some, such as Gunnar, Jizibex, and Zurzay, with less enthusiasm than others – to greet the newcomers.

  "The baby dragons are so cute!" Penny gushed, running up to pet one. The creature hissed, but after a growl from its mother grudgingly accepted the girl's caress. "They look just like little ponies with fangs and horns!"

  Now, jogging along the north beach, relatively naked with just gym shorts, a tank top, and her faithful Glock 20 strapped to her waist, Diana felt better physically and mentally than she had – allowing for the appropriate moments of survivor's guilt – in years. She was certainly more fit and slim and energetic than she'd been since her early thirties. She credited the exercise and clean-living. Fresh vegetables and meat, with minimal processed foods or sugary treats. Maybe the Paleolithic diet was onto something.

  What was missing from their strangely idyllic summer was a sense of purpose – or perhaps simply a sense of direction – but then she'd been without that since Dean's death and retiring from the Agency. As stressful and dangerous as their quest to save the Jensens had been, it had furnished a purpose. Now it was just about...well, living in the now. She'd heard that was pretty cool. And for the moment, that seemed true.

  A clear sign of having less stress and more free time was Diana's thoughts – sometimes even unwanted fantasies – about Gunnar Thorenson. In her honest moments, she acknowledged that she'd been attracted to him from the start. No sense in pretending that wasn't the case. She wasn't a dippy schoolgirl, after all. But attraction didn't mean she wanted action. When she thought of her husband, the space between feeling something toward another man and acting on it often loomed as large as the Grand Canyon – or even a deep, dark abyss without any visible bottom or sides.

  Oddly, unexpectedly, Gunnar hadn't made any move at all on her. Somehow he'd managed to convey that he wanted her – she was fairly sure he did, even though as time passed she sometimes wondered if it was her imagination – while never pressuring her or even suggesting he was preparing to cross over into intimacy the instant she supplied the bridge. Nearly four weeks since they'd settled in, and though always helpful and making it clear he had her back, he'd remained the perfect gentleman with a glint of mischief in his eyes that promised more when and if she was ready. She'd never known any man, including Dean, to exercise that kind of patience with her. Maybe it was his age. Or maybe it was hers – at 41 she just wasn't that hot anymore?

  Diana frowned and then smiled drolly at herself. Let's not be ridiculous. Even Gary had called her "smokin'," and surely there could be no finer certification than that?

  She rounded the corner on the lake, three miles into her run, feeling like she could go another ten without too much fuss. Lucy and her two babies were frolicking in the water off the north shore. Who knew dragons liked to swim? Lucy had performed the service of ridding the lake of it's one dangerous zoo creature: something that looked part-giant lobster, part monster-scorpion. The thing had smashed one of their boats out in the water, and if anyone but Gary had been aboard it probably wouldn't have ended well. But he'd managed to out-swim the creature to shore, narrowly escaping its frantically grasping pincers. Shortly after that, the thing had decided to take a lunge at Lucy while she was drinking on shore. Big mistake.

  According to Laurie, who'd been hanging out with her and her mini-dragons on the beach, Lucy had seized one of the thing's pincers, dragged it onto shore, and, in Laurie's words, "proceeded to dismantle it." Suggesting again to Diana that very few if any zoo creatures could go one-on-one with the prickly female dragon and live to tell about it. As an added bonus, the lobster-scorpion had provided delicious crablike meat for many meals that week.

  Diana dropped down on the end of a dock on the opposite end of the lake, now five miles from the resort, and fished out a stick of jerky soaked in raw honey-coated with "organic" pumpkin seeds – a specialty of the Twin Cities Resort's store and a nice energy booster during a long run, she'd found. She chewed on the jerky, savoring its rich, sweet flavor, and watched the devoted mother dragon and her babies thrashing around in the water.

  The three humanoid figures appeared out of nowhere maybe fifty meters above the playing dragons. At first, Diana thought they were just hovering there, but then the sun glinted off one side of a near-transparent sphere that enclosed them. It drifted over the dragons for several moments before Lucy noticed them and reared up out of the water into the air in a flash.

  "No, Lucy," said Diana, dread instantly filling her. She was about to raise her voice when Lucy bumped nose with the sphere – hard enough to jar the occupants a bit in their seats. Diana braced herself for some advanced weapon to be unleashed on the hapless dragon, perhaps a particle beam or laser or whatever high-tech killing devices were on board, but the sphere and its occupants merely drifted in a slow circle until Lucy apparently lost interest and returned to her babies. She ushered them out of the water into the air where they flew at high speed toward the surrounding forests.

  The sphere followed briefly before pausing and swiveling so that the figures inside appeared to face in her direction.

  Diana experienced another round of dread as the sphere glided over the lake straight for her. She fought down an impulse to jump up on the dock and run. She wasn't some scared wild animal. Why give them the satisfaction? Besides, they could simply turn and fly to her people on the other end of the lake. She remembered suddenly Overseer Aziz saying that no one would be permitted to use weapons any more advanced than their guns. Would it count as too technologically advanced if they shot firearms from an advanced ship? But that seemed unlikely. These people or things appeared more to be tourists than assailants.

  Still, Diana gripped the sides of the dock to keep herself from bolting as the sphere and its passengers silently approached. It stopped maybe forty feet away, a few meters in the air. From that distance, she could see the three figures inside as clearly as they could se
e her. Her first thought was that they appeared to be living trees, complete with a bark-like skin and spiny appendages and tubular faces/heads with irregular serrated tops as if made by a drunken lumberjack with a chainsaw. A visor-ish dark slit stretched a few inches down the top of their heads just above knotholes that might've been mouths. The knotholes shrunk and expanded, and Diana thought she heard a faint sound like humming. They were wearing clothing so form-fitting and close to the brownish color of their exposed skin that it was nearly invisible. Diana assumed they were not Keepers, given their non-insectile features, which made them...clients.

  Enjoying the world your zookeeper friends ravaged, you tourist pieces of shit? The thought came unbidden from anger she hadn't even noticed developing. Once acknowledged, it blossomed into full flower. She stared into the visor or eyes of the central creature which appeared content to return the favor.

  "A whole civilization murdered for your entertainment," Diana spoke in a low voice resonant with hostility. "Why don't you step out of your protective bubble and let me entertain you?"

  Diana slid out her Glock and rested it on one knee. She knew it was silly, but it made her feel better. When the creatures continued to hover before her, she raised the pistol and aimed it at the central figure. She gave the trigger a small squeeze, just short of firing – a built-in feature of Glocks that she'd always loved. She wouldn't fire, wouldn't play the part of some dumb, frustrated animal beating at the glass partition or bars. But she did mimic the recoil of the handgun as if she had fired it before replacing it in her holster.

  The targeted alien did something she did not see coming: it raised one of its four spiny, tree-limb arms and pointed its end at her. Diana watched, chills running wild through her, as one of the branch-"fingers" of the creature's hand curled back in clear imitation of a trigger being cocked – and then rocked backward in a perfect mirror image of her mimicking recoil with her pistol.