Zoo Girl

by Jennifer Bardsley

  Zoo Girl

  a short story

  Jennifer Bardsley

  Contents

  Zoo Girl

  About the Author

  Also by Jennifer Bardsley

  Zoo Girl

  “I don’t care what the keepers say, I’m not going to mate with you.” I scoop up my bundle of twigs and sidestep closer to the glass wall of our exhibit.

  “Come on, Emilia, don’t be like that.” Carter rolls his neck and gives me a lopsided smile. “The other girls had a real good time.”

  “Then go back to their enclosures and leave me alone.” Carter used to be harmless, but ever since his voice changed, I don’t trust him. Crouching down, I pretend to inspect a dandelion weed. But really I reach up the hem of my pant leg for a shiv.

  “Emilia. Babe.” Carter’s blond hair glistens in the artificial light. The keepers turn on the UV fluorescents every day for approximately twelve hours. Or at least I think it’s twelve hours. I haven’t seen a clock since I was thirteen. Carter licks his lips and takes a step forward.

  “Don’t even think about it!” Quick as a flash, I whip out the homemade shiv I’ve carved from bamboo. It’s small and easy to conceal, but it boasts a wicked point. “I’m not interested in contributing to your incestuous gene pool.”

  “You’d let the human race die out?” Carter looks at me in disbelief.

  “Better that then let my children live in a zoo.” I stare over Carter’s shoulder into the enclosures where the other female humans are kept. “Or become part of some messed up breeding program with their future half-siblings.”

  “But that means letting them win.” Carter indicates the giant, roach-like creatures staring at us from the other side of the glass. “Humanity: zero. Arthropods take all.”

  The eight-foot creatures who destroyed our planet are terrifying. Their bulging eyes look like mirror balls. When in close contact, their long antennae roam over you, tickling your skin with tiny feelers. When their curled up wings unfurl unexpectedly, it sounds like a thousand newspapers ripping.

  “They only win when they turn us into animals.” I grip the shiv tighter. “That’s when humanity has lost.”

  “Emilia.” Carter’s voice is suddenly soft. He looks around for a place to sit, and settles for a flat spot in the grass. “You know we don’t have a choice. It’s either me or some other male from a competing zoo. At least we’re almost the same age. You’re sixteen and I’m fourteen. What if the next guy they send is fifty-two?”

  I glare at him menacingly. “That’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

  Carter grabs a small pebble and tosses it into my pond. I’m surprised he found one. The keepers sweep my enclosure each day and confiscate anything that could be a weapon. With a quick glance over my shoulder, I hide the shiv back under my pant leg.

  “Look, I don’t want to do this anymore than you do,” Carter says.

  “Gee, thanks.”

  Carter continues. “You’re like my sister. If you and I hadn’t been standing at the ice cream truck that day, at the exact moment the Roaches came for us, we’d be dead like the rest of the human race.”

  “We don’t know that everyone is dead,” I say quickly. “My mom and her NASA buddies are probably out looking for us right now. I mean, yeah, we saw a lot of people die—”

  “Everyone died. You know that. We saw the bodies. You, me and Lex were the only ones who survived.”

  “Don’t talk about Lex. Don’t you dare!”

  “I can talk about my brother if I darn well want to!” Carter rips a fistful of grass up by the roots and scatters it everywhere. “You’re not the only one who loved him. I cried just as hard as you did when they popped his head off in their sick experiments.”

  “Stop!” I hold my hands over my ears, but Carter speaks louder.

  “I’m sorry I’m not Lex, okay? He should have been your partner instead of me. But at least I’m not some old guy. At least you know me.”

  “I can’t do this.” I brush an errant tear away with my thumb. “I can’t talk about Lex. I won’t!”

  Despite my brave words, the memory of my last days with Lex return. The three of us huddled under a glass dome on the Artho-ship as it zoomed us away from Earth. Lex, Carter, and I were stripped down naked and examined like specimens. For the first few weeks of the journey we were kept together. They fed us twigs, raw meat, fresh fruit, and leather until they finally determined what we would or would not eat. There was no possible way to communicate with the Arthropods. None of them seemed to understand English, and we couldn’t decipher the low frequency humming that emanated from their thoraxes.

  That first month was horrific—but survivable. But then they separated us into our own glass prisons and the experiments began. Electricity, gas, burns, and acid. They tested our skin bit by bit. I still have the scars on my shins to prove it. What’s worse was seeing Lex and Carter tortured. It was Lex’s accidental decapitation that cased the so-called-scientific program to end. I watched in horror as his head severed off his neck during an experiment on muscular-skeletal structure.

  Lex’s death must have been accidental because after that we were better cared for, as if the Arthopods wanted to keep Carter and me alive. As soon as we landed on their brown-green planet we discovered why. Our zookeepers greeted us upon arrival and brought us to our new home. I’ve been on display as Female Number Five ever since.

  I have a cordial relationship with the other female humans, and by “cordial,” I mean they no longer throw feces at me every time Carter talks to me. We aren’t sure how long the females have been here, or where they come from, but Numbers One, Two, Three, and Four don’t speak any language Carter or I recognize. It’s more like a long sequence of grunts and guttural moans. Thankfully there’s a door that separates their enclosure from mine.

  “Look,” Carter pleads. “I haven’t eaten in two days. Not since I did it with Four and got flea bites all over my ass.”

  “It’s not my fault you don’t get fed without procreating. Go hit up One, Two or Three.”

  Carter screws up his face. “But they’re ugly.” He stands up, and the full power of his six-foot frame towers over me. “And you’re not.”

  I jump two steps back and bump into the glass wall of my enclosure. “I give you half of my food. That’s plenty.”

  “Not for a hungry guy like me.” Carter grabs my elbow before I can dart out of the way. “Come on, Em. You’re going to like it.”

  I act on instinct. My fist flies out and hits him in the stomach, where my knuckles crunch against tight abdominal muscles. Tears of pain blur my vision. Carter squeezes me with one arm and reaches to pull down my pants with the other.

  “Leave me alone!” I stomp on his foot and twist away.

  “Stop being like this!” Carter yanks me by the hair. “This is our life now.”

  Thud. I kick him in the nuts like he deserves. Then, when he’s crouched down in pain, I rip out my shiv and brandish it against his face. “If you ever touch me again I will kill you!” I shove him over into the dirt. “Maybe I should cut off your balls right now just to be safe.”

  “No!” Squealing, Carter crawls away. “I promise I’ll leave you alone.”

  “You better. Now go back to the gate and stay there until they move you into the other cage.” I give him another kick in the butt to hurry him along. My eyes follow Carter as he approaches the separation between my enclosure and the other females’. Numbers Two and Four come over to greet him, pushing their grimy fingers through the bars and pawing at him in welcome. I don’t put the shiv away until I see Number Three come up and pet Carter’s hair.

  I shiver, despite the climate-controlled cooling system. With one eye still watching Carter, I walk over to my heat rock
and sit down on the granite. A tall swath of tropical plants grows next to it, and the pond shimmers a few feet away, tempting me with drastic measures. I could drown myself in that pond. It’s only a small puddle, but maybe if I tried hard enough it could be my final solution.

  But that’s the coward’s way out, and I wasn’t raised to be a coward.

  So I sit on the rock, soak in its warmth, and focus on the things I know to be true. My name is Emilia Reid. I’m from Orlando, Florida. My mother is an engineer for NASA. My father bakes cakes for Disney World. Lex was my best friend. When we rode bikes together in our cul-de-sac, his annoying brother Carter used to tag along. That’s the real me, I think. Not this.

  I’m not an animal until they make me an animal.

  A soft tapping against glass rouses me from my thoughts. Normally I ignore spectators, but I recognize the soft rhythm of this greeting. I slide off the rock and hurry to the wall.

  The Arthropod-juvenile wiggles its antennae wildly. Standing on six legs, it’s my height, half the size of the parent behind it, which stretches its wings a few times before scurrying across the sidewalk to a spot in the shade.

  Tap. Tap. Tapity tap. It’s our secret signal. I rap against the glass in reply, and my Arthro-friend hovers its antennae next to the glass as if it’s trying to read my thoughts.

  “You came back! I knew you would, but it’s been a few days now and I was getting worried.” I press my hand against the glass and it moves one of its feelers on the other side of my fingertips. Its mandible moves frenetically, but I can’t hear anything but my own breathing.

  “Did you bring anything to show me today?” I see a faint reflection of myself in its compound eyes.

  As if it understands my question, the Arthropod wiggles something with its foreleg and knocks it against the glass. I look down and see a two-foot doll with brown hair, blue eyes, and a crazed expression.

  “Aw, you bought a souvenir-me at the gift shop!” I bend down to get a closer look at my action figure. I’ve seen thousands of them before. Every Arthropod family that visits the Zoo seems to buy something. But I’ve never inspected the doll up close like this.

  The doll wears my original outfit: jeans and a softball T-shirt. It even has tiny sneakers with fake shoelaces. “It’s so cute!” I beam a smile. My friend grips the doll tight with two of its legs.

  “What are you doing over there?” Carter calls from his corner.

  “Shut up and mind your own business!” I holler back.

  “Why are you talking to the Roaches?”

  I turn my head in time to see Carter stand up. Behind him, the females grunt in approval and shove their hands through the bars.

  “Leave me alone!” I tell him and turn back to my friend.

  Its antennae stretch across the glass wall like it’s encircling me in protection. But there’s no way it can actually help me.

  The sound of Carter’s movements grows louder and I spin around as he steps close. “I said to leave me alone!”

  Carter cracks his knuckles. “You’d rather hang out with a Roach than with me, a fellow human? Maybe you need a taste of what humanity’s like.” There’s a gleam in Carter’s eyes that’s part hunger, part insanity.

  I bring out the shiv and plant my foot forward in a defensive stance. “I don’t like guys who act like animals. Go back to your harem, where you belong.”

  “Oh, I think I’m exactly where I belong.” Carter stretches his muscles like he’s preparing for a fight.

  Tap. Tap. Tappity tap. My Arthropod-friend is going crazy.

  I brandish my homemade weapon. “Haven’t we been over this before? If you lay one finger on me, I will kill you.”

  “I’m not afraid of you or your little knife.” Carter thrusts his fist forward, grabs my neck, and smashes my face against the glass before I have time to react. My lungs scream for oxygen. I swipe outward and slice Carter’s shirt. Ribbons of red blood ooze out of his side, but he doesn’t release his chokehold on my throat.

  Whack! Something beats against the glass behind me. Whack! Whack! Whackity Whack!

  My body goes limp as I begin to black out. My legs flail out from under me.

  “There you go,” Carter whispers. “I don’t need you to be awake for this.”

  My brain doesn’t work right. I see flashes flicker in front of me like on a dying television. Mom in her flight suit heading off to work. Dad frosting a cake and letting me lick the spoon. Lex and me playing cards in my treehouse and Carter shaking the rope ladder, begging to join us. The Arthropod invasion with thousands of explosions. Lex, Carter, and me being sucked away onto their spaceship. Everything is fuzzy.

  Tap. Tap. Whackety whack! I hear the sound of glass cracking and the smell of burning flesh.

  “Ah!” Carter shouts, suddenly releasing me.

  Oxygen floods my brain and I see two enormous Arthropods pull Carter off of me—and kill him with a bolt of electricity. A third keeper confiscates my shiv. I look down, gasping for breath, and am grateful to see that my clothes are still on and intact. Carter’s body lies at an unnatural angle, his forearm singeing. The sight of his dead body should disturb me. He’s my last connection to home. But I feel nothing but relief.

  Tap. Tap. Tapity tap. Urgent rapping behind me makes me spin around. My friend hops up and down on its six legs, its parent right next to it. The toy-me is broken in half, and the glass wall is cracked where the doll beat against the glass. That must be what got the keepers’ attention.

  I reach my hand out to where my friend’s antennae waits. “You saved me!” I smoosh my face up against the glass and two tears spill down my cheek.

  Tap. Tap. Tapity tap. My friend stops jumping and stands still, its parent’s antenna now motioning for the two of them to leave.

  A keeper scurries forward and offers me a tube of juice, a treat reserved for special occasions. I take the juice without opening it. More keepers crawl over, and what feels like hundreds of feathers brush over me as their antennae scan me for injuries. My focus is still on my friend, standing outside the glass, so I don’t realize the keepers have brought in a traveling cage until it’s too late.

  The delicious aroma of fresh-baked brownies catches my attention and I turn my head to investigate. By the time I look back toward the window, my Arthropod-friend is gone.

  Its sudden disappearance is more than I can take.

  No friend. No future. No hope. I might as well eat brownies.

  I walk into the glass box and let them trap me. One of the keepers hoists my cage onto his back and marches me out of the exhibit.

  I stuff chocolate into my mouth and let my tears fall.

  It’s been three years since I’ve been outside my enclosure. The only parts of the zoo I’ve seen are the human beings exhibit, and the quarantine area where I was first housed. I wonder if that’s where they’ll take me now in preparation for trading me to another zoo. Carter always threatened that this could happen. I bet my description will say, “violent female” from now on. Or maybe “unmateable.”

  I lick the last brownie crumbs off my fingers and peer out my glass box. The outside environment is made up of soft turf, tropical vegetation, and concrete paths leading from one enclosure to another. Elephants. Tigers… Pterodactyls… Kangaroos… My eyes go wide as we pass each exhibit. The zoo visitors stare at my conveyance, curious to see an animal being transported. I scan their bodies for some sign of my friend, but one Roach blends into the next. Nobody reaches out to tap my glass.

  My stomach twists from motion sickness. Or maybe it was the rich brownies eaten too fast. Where are they taking me? Was this my last meal? Nerves tangle my intestines. I hug my knees tight and rest my forehead against my legs. Then, a moment later, it feels like the floor drops out from under me. My glass box crashes to the ground and tumbles onto its side.

  Why did the keeper drop me?

  Whoosh. A hissing noise spins around my box and gray smoke blocks out visibility.

  Whiz. Hiss. Whoo
sh. A fog of smoke blankets the area. Tendrils of gas sneak into my box through the perforated air holes until I plug them with my hand to protect my air space. Hisssssssss! The noises continue, each sound bringing more smoke.

  How much oxygen do I have left? My rusty geometry skills fail me. This box is about six feet by eight feet by five feet. That means I have… Hell, I don’t know.

  My heart sounds like a snare drum. I squeeze my eyes shut and force myself to be calm. Breathing too rapidly will only waste air. Whoosh! I focus on the noises. What’s happening?

  Panic builds until I dare to look. I open my eyes and see swirling clouds of black smoke obscuring the atmosphere all around my glass crate. My arm aches from lifting it up to block the air holes, but I don’t dare let the mysterious vapor enter my space.

  Then, as abruptly as the smoking noises began, they stop and the outside world becomes quiet. Too quiet. All I can hear is my own ragged breathing.

  The smoke rolls away, melting into the atmosphere one poof at a time.

  First I see swirls of gray mist. Then patches of green and brown. And then finally, the fog lifts and I see what’s become of the outside world.

  My keepers, and all their Arthropod comrades, lie flat on their back, with their lifeless legs pointed straight at the sky. Every living creature is dead, even the zoo animals I see in the distance.

  Shoot! I think. Now what? I look at the carcasses around me and see a small Arthropod clutching a broken humanoid action figure. My friend!

  That’s the moment when I feel totally alone. Maybe I should release my hand and allow whatever poison is outside to kill me too. My shoulders shake with sobs.

  But then I see a small figure in neon green stomp toward me. The creature is my height and walks on two feet, with a face hidden by a large plastic bubble. The closer it gets, the more I freak out. No matter who or what this unknown alien is, I need to be ready for it. I stop crying and plaster on a brave expression. It circles my box four times, carefully inspecting me, before reaching into a side pouch and pulling out a gas mask. The figure points to the mask and then to me.