Near the administration building (too near, infact), Roger leaped lightly over the railing and up to the keeper’s entrance to an unoccupied animal enclosure. If only we had the money, we could put Sun bears in there. The enclosure had been meant for Kodiak bears, but the AZA thought the harp-wire wouldn’t hold them in. Roger keyed open the entrance, sent his dog inside, and relocked the entrance—bending first to pick up an animal exhibit sign from inside. He gritted his teeth as his dog barked in protest. The zoo director in her office could certainly hear the barking—and it would not please her. Although comfortable with lions and tigers, she was frightened of big dogs and flinched at every bark.
Roger snapped the sign to the array of harp-wires that separated the enclosure from the visitors (for the safety of the animals, not the visitors).
He stood back and observed the sign. It seemed to float in front of the enclosure. At a distance of six feet, the harp-wire was all but invisible.
Dog (“Sniffles”)
Canis domesticus
Hungarian Kuvas. Protects sheep.
(The head zookeeper’s dog)
Maybe it’s better we don’t have the money. Roger often parked Sniffles in the enclosure, occasionally even overnight when he had to travel to a zoo conference. He’s big enough to make a good zoo exhibit. It was very convenient. Roger pursed his lips. Except for the director.
He turned and trotted up the steps to the administration building, thumbing through the mail as he did so. Only three letters. He slowed his steps toward the director’s office. One of the letters was strange. Initially, he thought the return address bore the logo of The American Zoo and Aquarium Association, but instead of AZA, it displayed IZA. International Zoo Association maybe? Didn’t know there was one. He gave an internal shrug—I have other things to worry a bout—and walked into Zoo Director Angelina Grouss’s office.
“Mail’s here,” said Roger, dropping the three letters on her desk. Just at that inopportune moment, Sniffles barked. Being a warm, late spring day, the window was open and the bark reverberated through the office.
Angelina jumped at the noise. More than startled, she looked scared.
He attempted to head off a potentially unpleasant exchange with humor. “I can’t understand,” said Roger with a smile and a hearty voice, “how a zoo director can be afraid of dogs.” Roger saw Angelina’s face fill with anger. Woops! I guess she didn’t see the humor.
“Damn it, Roger.” Angelina ripped open an envelope. “An animal that big should be behind bars.” She glanced at the contents and tossed the paper into the trash.
“At the moment he is behind bars—or behind harp-wire, anyway.” Seeing another way of avoiding an argument, Roger pressed on. “And that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“You mean not bringing that noisy beast of yours to the zoo?” While speaking, she dispatched the second envelope and its content to the trash.
“Sniffles is quiet around animals—most animals, that is.”
Angelina frowned and Roger worried that he might not have been misunderstood.
“Look,” said Roger. “On more than one occasion, my dog has saved me from being mauled.”
“Then you should be more careful.” She picked up the third envelope and pointed it like a knife. “Or perhaps you need to take a leave of absence to go back for more training.” She tore open the envelope. “Or maybe you need to spend less time lollygagging with our patrons.”
“That’s an important part of my job,” said Roger. “Lollygagging, as you call it. Our patrons have a need to feel connected to our animals, to talk about them. And I’m easy to spot—a man in a khaki ranger’s outfit accompanied by a large white dog.”
Again, Sniffles barked and Angelina jumped.
“The dog’s important,” Roger went on. “He breaks the ice with reserved visitors, and gives their children something big to pet.”
Angelina’s eyes left Roger’s and dropped to the sheet she was reading.
“Actually,” said Roger, trying to regain her attention, “what I wanted to talk to you about is harp-wire.”
She looked up. “What?”
“The lemurs are behind harp-wire. They’ve learned to pluck the wires. Sounds sort of nice. Musical. I think we might do a CD.”
“Are you nuts?”
“We don’t have any artistic elephants or chimpanzees, and we need revenue.”
Angelina scowled. “Not that much, we don’t.”
“But I’ve heard you’re thinking of letting one of my keepers go.”
“Oh.” Angelina seemed to turn her full attention to her head zookeeper. “I may have to. Budgets are tight.”
She lowered her eye again to the sheet of mail. Roger thought she was avoiding his eyes out of embarrassment.
“Then you need revenue,” said Roger to the top of her head.
“What?”
“I said—”
“No,” said Angelina, flourishing the sheet. “I mean this.” She tossed it to him. “Read it.”
MY DEAR DIRECTOR GROUSS:
THE IZA IS DELIGHTED TO ANNOUNCE THAT WE HAVE APPROVED YOUR APPLICATION FOR A CAPTIVE BREEDING PERMIT FOR BUNYIPS. EXPECT SHIPMENT OF TWO BUNYIPS, A YEAR’S WORTH OF FOOD FOR THE CREATURES, AND DETAILED CARE INSTRUCTIONS. YOUR UNUSED BEAR HABITAT WILL BE PERFECT FOR THEM;THE HARP-WIRE BARRIER WILL BE MORE THAN SUFFICIENT TO CONSTRAIN TWO ADULT BUNYIPS.
Roger stopped reading and raised his eyes to Angelina’s. “Bunyips?” He narrowed his eyes. “I should have been consulted about a captive breeding program.”
“None of my doing.” She reached forward, grabbed the sheet, and slapped ot onto her desk. “Some kind of a mistake.” She stared down at the paper. “And what the hell are bunyips?”
“You might check ISIS.”
Angelina pulled up her keyboard and brought up the International Species Information System. After a minute or so of key fiddling, she shook her head, then pushed away the keyboard. “Nothing!”
“Here, let me try.” Roger took up the keyboard and Angelina, with an expression of noblesse oblige, swiveled the monitor so he could see it. “Fine. Be my guest.”
Roger did a Web search. “Ah,” he said after about thirty seconds. “Here it is. Bunyip.” He scanned the article, then looked back at Angelina. “It’s an Australian animal ... that probably doesn’t exist.”
“Excuse me?”
“Some of the early Australian explorers reported seeing an unknown animal. The problem was that each of these explorers had contradictory descriptions of the animal.” Roger chuckled. “But all agreed it was pretty big—whatever that meant.”
“Give me a break,” said Angelina.
“Even now,” said Roger, “some people believe it really does exist.” He picked up the letter. “Says the animals are remarkably docile. Healthy specimens.” He laughed. “And the taller one’s named Twerx and the other one’s Korfen.”
Again, Angelina grabbed the letter. She glared at it. “Someone’s stupid idea of a joke.”
“Someone who knows our zoo,” said Roger.
Angelina crumpled the letter and, holding it between thumb and forefinger as if it were plague infested, dropped it in the trash basket. “I don’t need this right now.”
Sniffles barked.
“Damn it!” said Angelina.
Just as he’d concluded his rounds the following day, a glorious late September morning with the first bare sniff of autumn in the air, Roger received a frantic phone call from the zoo’s loading dock.
“Bunyips?” said Roger, with a sinking feeling. “I’ll be right over.” He slipped his cell phone into his pocket and, with Sniffles padding behind, rushed to the loading dock. He arrived to see three keepers peering through breathing holes in a large crate.
One of the keepers looked up as Roger approached. “You’re not going to believe this.” The keeper gestured at one of the breathing holes.
“Let’s get a better view.” Roger swung open a small hinged pa
nel on the crate, exposing a barred feeding window. He peered in.
Two white faces peered back. They had wide eyes giving them the look of kids having just been caught raiding the cookie jar.
“Jeez!” Roger jumped back in surprise. The faces retreated as well. Roger edged closer, and again looked in—but gingerly.
Mouth open in strained belief, he saw that the alleged bunyips were between five and six feet tall, walked upright, and were covered in long white fur.
“What the hell are they?” came a Russian-accented voice from behind.
“Beats me, Sergei,” said Roger, glancing over his shoulder at his second in command. “If someone told me they were the abominable snowmen, I’d believe them.” He caught sight of another shipping crate. On its side in stenciled letters was the legend, “Bunyip Chow.” “But I guess we’ll have to call them bunyips. Any documentation come with the shipment?”
Sergei picked up a large manila mailing envelope from on top of the chow crate and handed it over.
Roger opened the clasp and flipped through the papers, finding a cover letter and a manual of care instructions. While he perused them, Sniffles sniffed at the crate, then commenced barking and wagging his tail.
“Your dog seems to like smell of our bunyips,” said Sergei.
“I guess.” Roger watched as Sniffles ran circles around the crate.
“Well,” said Sergei. “What we do with bunyips?”
Roger switched his gaze from his dog to Sergei. “For the moment anyway, let’s stow the crate in the old Kodiak bear enclosure.”
Sergei sent another keeper to fetch the forklift and then turned to Roger. “Well, I think they probably result of genetic engineering.”
“But why?” said Roger with a gentle laugh. “And how?”
Sergei shrugged.
As the forklift reached the bear enclosure, Roger ran ahead to open the entrance gate while Sergei steadied the crate.
“Move it inside,” Roger called out to the driver.
“You got it!” the driver called back.
Watching the forklift rumble through the entrance, Roger scratched Sniffles between the ears. “No more free hotel for you, I’m afraid.” He glanced toward the administration building and saw Angelina looking out at them from an open window.
The forklift driver lowered the fork. “Damn,” he said, jumping from the cab. “I forgot the rope.” He waved and headed for the gate. “Be right back.”
Glancing once more at the window, Roger saw Angelina gesturing frantically for him to come to her office.
Roger pursed his lips. I’m sure this’ll be fun. He handed the manila envelope with the care instructions to Sergei. “See to getting our bunyips settled, will you?” He turned to go, but then stopped. “No, wait.” He reclaimed the envelope. “Better leave things as they are until the director approves it.” He turned to go. “Wish me luck.”
“Udachi!” said Sergei with a laugh.
Walking toward the administration building, Roger visualized those bunyip faces. He frowned. He’d prided himself on being able to identify any living animal that had two or four legs and fur. But he couldn’t identify these. Maybe when I see them outside their crate. He shook his head. No. Sergei must be right. Genetic manipulation. It’s the only answer. By the time he’d started up the stairs to Angelina’s office, he’d decided: After work, for the sake of his professional self-respect, he’d scour the Internet to see who could have possibly engineered the creatures.
“You should take a look at them,” said Roger. “They’re sort of cute, actually—whatever they are.”
“I don’t care if they’re Bambi,” said Angelina, standing, back rigid, her face as red as a baboon’s bottom. “Send them back!”
“Who knows how long they’ve been cooped up in that crate,” said Roger, softly, trying to bring calm. “They’ve got to be let out to run around. And I’m sure they need to be fed and watered.” He glanced toward the window. “I think we should let them free where they are now—in the old bear enclosure.”
“Their comfort’s not my concern,” said Angelina, her nose slightly elevated. “I want them out of here. Send them back—immediately! Our budget is stretched enough without having to take care of these ... animals.”
Roger ruffled through the papers that came with the crate. “You used to be fond of animals,” he said, softly, almost to himself.
“Not so much after thirty years on this job,” said Angelina, equally softly.
Roger looked up from the papers. “I can’t seem to find a return address.”
“Impossible!” Angelina pulled the papers from his hand. “Let me see.”
“This will bring the zoo a lot of visitors,” said Roger as Angelina pawed through the papers. “And revenue.”
After a few more seconds, Angelina sighed. “No return address.” She slapped the papers to her desk. “I guess we have no choice. Let ’em out.” She grabbed the telephone. “But I’m going to call the AZA. They, if anyone, will know what’s going on.”
She hit the AZA button on the autodialer and explained the situation to the first voice that answered.
The receiver was at high volume so Roger couldn’t help but hear.
“Bunyips?” came the voice on the phone, followed by a laugh. “Wait a sec. Kevin should hear this.”
Another voice came on the line and Angelina explained again.
“All right. What’s this all about?”
“This is not a joke,” said Angelina, coolly.
“Come on, mate!” said the voice. “Don’t you have anything better to do than making prank calls?”
Roger heard the click of the connection being broken.
Angelina slammed down the phone. “Just let me get my hands on whoever’s behind this farce.”
Gingerly, Roger picked up the bunyip papers. “I’d better go and take care of our new exhibit.” He turned to go. “It’s my job to see that they’re happy.”
“What about seeing that I’m happy?” said Angelina under her breath.
Roger, pretending not to hear, hurried outside, relieved that Sniffles hadn’t barked during the Angelina confrontation.
With Roger and Sergei on opposite sides to stabilize it, the forklift driver raised the crate and backed it out to where it all but blocked the enclosure entrance. With Sniffles standing on guard, Roger climbed to the top of the crate and tied an end of the rope to the top of the crate’s far side, which also served as a door. He unlatched the side and lowered it like a drawbridge to the ground.
The two crate occupants bounded out and padded up to the harp-wire barrier. Roger watched them. The bunyips looked like giant lemurs, but with slightly more compact faces. They walked upright. Roger gasped as he saw that their kneecaps were on the wrong side of their knees.
“Look at way those creatures walk!” said Sergei, his eyes wide and incredulous. “Like storks!”
“Yeah.”
The bunyips grabbed onto the harp-wire.
“Opposable thumbs,” said Roger. “Primates, maybe.” He climbed down to stand beside Sergei.
“Look like prosimians.” Sergei gave a hint of a nod. “Da,” he said, more to himself than to Roger. “Is genetic engineering. Must be.”
“Must be,” Roger echoed, softly. He had the forklift driver back the crate out. Then, with Sniffles guarding the entrance, he and Sergei backed out as well. “Sniffles. Come!” Roger called out. But instead, Sniffles bounded up to the bunyips and, with tail wagging, sniffed at them. For an instant, Roger worried for the safety of his dog, but then realized that Sniffles, bred to take down wolves, could take care of himself.
The Bunyips turned from the harp-wire and looked at the dog.
Jumping up and down with legs stiff—the “come and play” sign—Sniffles barked.
The bunyips looked at one another. Then Korfen, the shorter bunyip, also barked—a perfect imitation of Sniffles.
“They’re mimics,” said Roger. “Wonder how intelligent th
ey are.”
“As intelligent as parrots,” said Sergei.
On impulse, Roger shouted, “Are you intelligent?”
Twerx stopped playing with the dog and looked up. “Are you intelligent?” it said in Roger’s voice.
Roger laughed.
“Parrots,” said Sergei.
“Hmm.” Roger watched the three creatures play. It seemed as if Sniffles and the bunyips had already become good friends. “Our bunyips seem docile but fearless,” said Roger. He swiveled around. “Okay. We’re done. Let’s go.”
“You leave dog in with animals?”
“Sure. Why not?” Roger chuckled. “Maybe Sniffles won’t lose his hotel after all.”
At home that night, Roger searched the net. He did rank-ordered searches on “animal genetic manipulation,” “designer animals,” and “GM animals.” After eliminating the false positives, there weren’t many hits. When he’d eliminated those as well, he let his gaze roam over the false positives, and then settle on “Unique Pet Labs.” Initially, Roger had dismissed it as a pet store specializing in Labrador Retrievers. Idly, he clicked on the link.
“Ah.”
The UPL website informed that the company took domesticated animals and genetically engineered them to create new species for pets.
“That’s it! That’s got to be it.” He whistled when he saw the price, but read on. “Yes!” he exclaimed when he saw that UPL was based in Melbourne, Australia. On impulse, he phoned the company. With the time difference, they should be open. When someone answered, Roger said he wanted a custom pet and described a bunyip, leaving out mention of the reversed kneecaps. “I don’t suppose you could do that,” said Roger, “could you?”
“Oh, but we can.”
“Really?” Roger snapped alert. “Have you ... done something like this before?”
“Yes, we have, actually.”
Roger mentally crossed his fingers. “Could you ... perhaps send me pictures?”
“Unfortunately not. Client confidentiality, you understand.”
“Yes,” said Roger with a sigh. “Of course.” He asked for a brochure to be sent and hung up. Then, pondering how he could find out who that client was, Roger went to bed.
Analog Science Fiction and Fact 12/01/10 Page 18
