Part I

Part I

Chapter1: Happenings at the Zoo

The first day was an overcast one, but it was often overcast in September City. Maritime fog… the City wasn’t on the sea, but Lake Pluvium defined it to the north. That was where the fog came from. Not that it was a bad thing: September City had grown so large because people loved the subdued, placid weather.

But as for the first day…

There where about one hundred and fifty of them at the September City Public Zoo, High School kids. It was one of the rare fieldtrips from Auguston High, for the AP Biology 2 Class. Sophomores milled about from exhibit to exhibit, watching each other more than the bored looking animals. They all wore dark sweaters and coats to fend off the chilly wind; there still was no sun to warm them, despite the fact that it was nearing noon.

A girl of sixteen stood, or rather leaned, against the railing of the polar bear enclosure. She was cold, huddled down into her black sweater like child into its mother’s arms. The wind was blowing openly there, and her dark, wavy hair was –to her annoyance- being continuously blown into her eyes. Sighing, she brushed her hair back with a comb of fingers. It was obscuring her view of the big, lumbering creatures. She knew that polar bears were among the most dangerous bears (these in particular had just been taken from the wild and were particularly aggressive) but she couldn’t help wanting to reach down and hug them. So cute… she wished they made better pets… she liked them so much.

Quietly, someone was creeping up on her. This person was also dressed in dark colors. He moved without putting much pressure on his feet; there was little noise. He reached out his long arms, tipped with pale hands… he was only a few inches from her soft sides. He lunged, hands wrapping around her waist and lifting… the girl screamed…

O O

That was me.

Guilty.

My bad.

But that’s not a very good way to start off. What I mean to say is, it was me that snuck up on Natalie. And don’t worry, I’m not some kind of creepy rapist/murderer. I was her boyfriend. She was screaming because she’s extremely ticklish… I know, kind of mean for me to tickle her, but she loved me so it was ok. I loved her too. It was the greatest time of my life, but it didn’t last long. Things happen, things change. If you don’t adapt, you die. That sounds really morbid, but in Annear, it’s true. Always has been.

On a happier note, I set Natalie down quickly. She was still laughing when her feet touched the ground, and she instantly curled up defensively, making it impossible for me to reach her stomach. I stood back to let her catch her breath, then put an arm over her shoulder as she came back up.

God, she was beautiful. She had long, dark hair that I called curly, but that she insisted was only wavy. I never got the difference. Her face reminded me of a hexagon, with a strong, well defined jaw. Her eyes were impossible to describe, perfectly shaped eyes that were gold around the center and more… kind of turquoise around edges like little planets. And she was so smart… a little temperamental, but hey: no one’s perfect. I loved her more than anyone… that’s why it hurts so much to think about this now. I won’t go into our relationship much further, except to say that we were best friends for years; in 9th grade, I cautiously asked her out. I think her exact response was, “What took you so long, idiot?” She kissed me on the spot. God, I loved her so much…

You probably think I’m getting mushy on you now, so I’ll continue the story in all seriousness. I’m renowned for my seriousness, did I tell you that? No? Well, that’s an absolute lie. As Natalie put it, I’m a goof. Ah well, I’d rather by happy than right, so I won’t correct her.

She looked up me as she uncurled.

“Hey,” she said, still giggling reflexively.

“Hey,” I said back. I turned to see what she had been looking at: polar bears. She had some kind of thing for animals. There were about six cats lying around her house, two dogs, and two birds. Her parents hated it, but neither of them could say no about much to her. “Lost track of you for a second. Just can’t wait, huh?”

“Well, I figured you’d find me.” She twisted over to look at the bears too. She snuggled up against my side –it was really cold that day- and I put my arm around her again. “And you did. Plus, I didn’t go very far.”

Natalie spaced out for a few minutes after that. We both had the tendency to do that, but while I was usually just half-asleep, I think she was deep in thought. She’d never tell me what about… it was alright though. No fun in knowing everything she was thinking.

“I like polar bears,” she murmured at last. “Maybe we can live up north someday, where they live. Like Cape January or December City or something. Plus, there’s the mountains up there so we could go skiing and stuff.”

“Yeah, maybe.” I didn’t want to tell her that I hated the cold. I liked the sunnier cities better, Juneau and San Julio. Even Marchville, though it could get pretty cold there too. No polar bears, though. There was another brief silence, and this time I chose to break it. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” she replied, looking up at me with a white smile. “But… is something wrong? You’re not usually this quiet.”

“I don’t know. I feel fine. Maybe a little tired.”

She eyed my uncertainly, but didn’t say anything and snuggled back against my chest. I really didn’t feel like anything was wrong. In fact, I felt pretty good… well, maybe not, now that I thought about it. There was a weird feeling in my lower back… sort of like a chill you get when you have a cold. It wasn’t painful though, or really even uncomfortable… just different. Not something that had been there before. I was about to mention this to Natalie when it happened.

I didn’t know how or why then, but we fell. Not like over the rail or onto our backs or anything. Just fell, straight down. There was no loss of the balance or failing of metal. I didn’t feel anything; I just fell straight through the ground, taking Natalie with me.

I’d been the Splash World water park in San Julio: there’s a ride there called the Mine Shaft, or something like that, that takes you down this long, curving, pitch-black tunnel before dumping you rudely out in a deep pool. That was what this felt like: we went straight down before curving at a steady ninety-degree angle and flying, feet first, out of the dark.

There was even a pool to catch us.

The second we were out of the dark, I realized that Natalie had been screaming. I didn’t hear her, but I remembered it. I knew she had. I only heard her for a second though, because my head went under the water.

It was freezing, and the shock almost made me open my mouth and inhale the water, but I was able to clamp my jaw and keep shut. My clothes were soaked and making me colder… and heavier. Luckily, I was on the Auguston High swim team. I wasn’t going down anytime soon. Natalie wasn’t as lucky. I could feel her trashing unsuccessfully next to me, fighting to get up. I squinted through the water to see her dark form next to me; shimmering bubbles were drifting from her mouth –she was loosing air fast.

I kicked off my shoes and pulsed through the water towards her, wrapping her arms with mine so she couldn’t hit me. She panicked and started struggling harder. She thought I was trying to drown her… and now threatening to drown us both. Before she could struggle free, I started kicking through the frigid water. My head broke the surface a second later, Natalie’s immediately afterwards.

I could hear her gasping and gurgling next to me, but I was already looking around to see where we were. There was a sheer, 20-foot wall of suspiciously artificial-looking rock to the left… and a concrete ledge just a few feet to my right, opposite the wall. Railing ran along the wall to my left… holy shit. Realization hit me –I was in the polar bear enclosure.

Natalie started screaming again –I don’t think she knew where we were yet. It was obvious that we wouldn’t last too long in the water. We were both weighed down by our layers of clothing, and I was already treading water like crazy to keep us both up. Not to mention the cold, which was leaching my strength fast. I beat my legs and leaned to the right, propelling Natalie and me over to the concrete. There weren’t any steps out, but Natalie realized what I was doing and stopped screaming long enough to reach out and grab the ledge. It was only six inches or so above the water. I unhooked my arms from Natalie and grabbed the ledge too, pushing her up and out of the pool before removing myself as well.

Once on the concrete, I rolled onto my back, breathing harder than I had in a long time. Natalie was next to me, whimpering with fear and cold. She saw me and dragged herself over, wrapping around my chest with her soaked arms and hugging me hard. I could feel only a little warmth coming through our layers of freezing clothes, but it was good.

“Thank you,” she panted. “Oh my God, James, thank you so much. I’m so sorry.”

I nodded feebly and put my arm on her back.

“What the hell just happened?” she asked. I wished I could tell her. When I didn’t answer after a few seconds, she asked, “Where are we?”

“I think,” I said between shivering breaths. “We fell. Into the. Cage.”

“What!” she struggled up to look me in the eye and make sure I was serious. I wasn’t sure, but there was no other explanation. The water we had fallen into was the trench that ran around the bottom of the bear enclosure for them to swim in… or maybe to keep them in, I wasn’t sure. It was the only thing that made sense.

Natalie scrambled to her knees, then to a crouched and stood. She looked around, her wet hair flying around her in dripping strings. I didn’t have to wait for her to say it to know my hunch was right: I heard the throaty growl of a bear only a few meters away.

Now it was my turn to jump to my feet. Natalie was behind me, and I spun quickly to stand next to her. We had been laying behind a fake rock –one of several around the enclosure- which had been the only thing keeping the polar bears from knowing we were there. There were two of them: big, white, abominations; black muzzles spewing steam; black eyes glinting with surprise. They were named Lola and Zuzu. Sickeningly adorable names for such scary things…

One of them growled again and started lumbering forward. It was the closer of the two at about fifteen feet away. I pushed Natalie gently behind me and jumped up on the fake rock; making yourself look bigger is supposed to scare bears, right? My sudden motion made the animal pause for a moment and flinch back, but it continued toward me a second later. It had realized I hadn’t grown any, just jumped. Shit. I glanced over my shoulder so quickly I hurt my neck to see Natalie.

“Call for help!” I told her shakily. “Shout as loud as you can. Tell them what happened.”

She nodded and turned away, looking back toward the wall where we had been standing.

I looked around. I had a few seconds until the bear reached me. The enclosure had twenty-foot walls on all sides; it was in a rough square with the trench running along two sides. There was a little blue door on the wall opposite me that led to polar bears’ inner rooms, but it was closed and doubtlessly locked. Natalie was crying her head off for help behind me, but no one had shown up at any of the ledges above us. With no sign of aid, I turned back to the bear.

It was getting closer, but slowly. Unsure of why I was there, it had decided to take its time getting to me. After a few more seconds, the bear must’ve decided that I wasn’t a threat: it could take care of me easily.

The bear reared up, suddenly becoming a foot taller than me even with the boost of the rock. It stood on its hind legs like a big white dog begging for food. It roared and stumbled down, onto the front of my rock. Its feet crashed down just inches from mine; I yelled in fear and tumbled back as well, falling off the rock and almost knocking Natalie back into the water. The bear roared again, making Natalie scream again…

I couldn’t let anything happen to her. Working off something I’d heard somewhere, I lashed out as fast I could, slapping the bear on the nose. A second later, I remembered that you were supposed to hit sharks on the nose, not bears… oh well. The animal only looked vaguely annoyed and stepped toward us again.

I became aware of people appearing around the edge of the pit, classmates and strangers, watching us with horror. A few were relaying Natalie’s message on to whoever would listen. Suddenly, the door behind the bears opened and two zoo workers with long poles emerged, shouting for attention.

They were too late. The bear lunged forward one more time, and though I lunged out it with my fist, I didn’t do much to help myself. It swatted me with a huge black and white paw, knocking me into the water. I hit the back of head on something as I splashed under. I knew that I wanted to swim back up, out of the water, but then… I didn’t want to. It hurt too much… instead, I decided to wait. Maybe I’d try again in the morning…

My vision faded to black. The last thing I saw was a silvery stream of bubbles drifting away through the water as blue as the edges of Natalie’s eyes…