by Bryan Chick
They’d entered directly into the living quarters of the animals. Moonlight fell through large skylights, revealing the room in shadowy shapes. Three of the surrounding concrete walls were made to look like rocky mountainsides with steep ledges, narrow cliffs, and shallow caves. Fake boulders were scattered across a dirt floor, and a weak waterfall emptied into a shallow wading pool, its ceaseless splash the only sound. About fifty feet away, steel bars stretched from the floor to the ceiling and spanned the length of the building. Beyond them was the viewing area. Across the ground lay a shadowy mound. A rhino.
Richie stared over his shoulder and checked the door they’d entered through. Was it big enough to fit their animal friend? It had better be.
“Is that him?” Lee-Lee whispered.
Richie shrugged, then remembered Lee-Lee couldn’t see him. “It’s too dark—I can’t tell.”
“Follow me,” said Lee-Lee.
As Lee-Lee headed deeper into the exhibit, Richie followed her marks. She approached the sleeping rhino, which had its legs curled up beneath its hulking mass. Richie crouched low and stared at the rhino’s face. He tipped his head from side to side, hunting in the darkness for the animal’s features. He saw its ears, its nostrils, the smooth curve of its horn.
The rhino’s eyes sprang open, and Richie’s heart dropped as its gaze locked on him. Richie was almost certain it couldn’t see him—but could it smell him?
Richie waited . . . and waited. He became aware of the chameleons on his body, the patter and pull of their tiny claws.
The rhino twitched all over and then heaved itself upright. Richie realized it was too small to be Little Bighorn.
Richie took a step back, and then another. He winced as a twig snapped beneath his foot. The rhino’s dark eyes moved in his direction, and so did its horn. Richie stood perfectly still, feeling his heart drum. The rhino advanced, searching the area with a slow turn of its head.
Just off to Richie’s right, someone whistled. Lee-Lee. The rhino quickly veered her way, its head moving into a beam of moonlight, a shadow falling from its horn. When Lee-Lee whistled a second time, it was softer than before, and Richie realized she was moving across the exhibit, luring the rhino away. And then Richie saw something. One end of the wading pool was directly behind the Specter, and if she was paying too much attention to the rhino, she might not know it was there.
Before Richie could do anything, the water splashed and Lee-Lee became a ghostly form waist deep in the pool. Richie wondered why her camouflage was failing and then saw ripples in the water—chameleons swimming.
The rhino charged into the pool, splashing water over its body. Richie saw Lee-Lee’s head rock back and then she was pulled directly under the animal, which charged over her without slowing down and then stomped up onto the other shore, where it swung around and stared back into the pool.
As the water slowly stilled, Richie couldn’t see the chameleons or Lee-Lee. He searched the shore for watery footprints and found none. Had the Specter gotten out? Or had she—
He noticed movement in the near-still water. Bubbles—a stream of them. He tiptoed forward and saw Lee-Lee’s body half floating in the water, her legs dragging on the bottom of the pool, her fingers dangling from her outstretched hands. She was unconscious. On the other side of the pool, the rhino saw her, too.
Richie had a minute—maybe seconds—to save her life. But if he went into the water to pull her out, the rhino would spot him, too. And then they might both die.
CHAPTER 27
THE ZOO HOSPITAL
“Crap!” Sara said.
“What’s wrong?” Megan asked.
The two were standing at the front entrance of the zoo hospital. Sara had just punched a series of numbers into a keypad which secured the door.
Sara bounced a fingertip across the buttons again. “The code . . . it’s not working.”
“Maybe you entered it wrong—”
“No. I tried twice. It must have been changed.”
Megan stared down at the locked door. “Stand back.”
“Huh?”
She bumped Sara aside with her hip and produced a key, which slid easily into the lock. When she turned her wrist, the door popped open.
“You guys aren’t the only ones with a key to this town,” Megan said. She’d been carrying the magic key—the key that Tank had secretly delivered to Noah on the night the scouts had discovered the Secret Zoo—since Noah had given it to her on Halloween night.
Sara brushed past Megan to get through the door, and Megan dropped the key back into one of her normal pockets and followed.
The inside air smelled of animals, and cinder-block walls were painted a lifeless hospital gray. A hallway continued straight for about thirty feet before branching in two directions.
“C’mon,” Sara said.
In the dim light, Megan could faintly see the Specter—or her basic form, anyway. She looked like a ghost, and Megan knew that Sara had sent back a few chameleons to deliberately mark herself.
The girls continued up the hallway and turned down the right branch, where the cinder blocks were replaced by steel bars that divided a big space into individual rooms. Cages—at least ten on each side. Some were small and others as large as prison cells. On their straw-covered floors, different animals slept. A koala, an aardvark, a chimp.
“I don’t see—”
But then Megan did see. In the last cage on the left was Blizzard, sleeping on his side. As the girls rushed down the hall, a few startled animals swung their heads in their direction.
Blizzard looked weak, lying on the floor. And a good deal thinner. Squares of thick gauze were heavily taped to two bare spots on his side. Flimsy bits of straw were threaded through his white fur.
“Bliz!” Megan said.
The bear’s eyes eased open and he stared, confused, at the space in front of him.
“Over here!”
Blizzard raised his long neck and looked over toward the sound.
Megan pushed the cage door. Locked. She grabbed her magic key and fitted it into the slot. The heavy door swung inward, groaning on dry hinges.
Sara grabbed her shoulder. “Stop!” she said in a whisper filled with the urgency of a scream.
“What? What are—”
“Shh!”
The girls froze in place and listened. Footsteps. Someone appeared at the branch in the hall, turned, and headed their way. A guard. He had a thin mustache, thin lips, and beady eyes. When he saw the open cage, he halted so suddenly that his narrow frame almost toppled over. For what seemed a long time, he stood perfectly still. Then he lifted a walkie-talkie to his mouth and pressed the button to transmit his voice.
CHAPTER 28
THE GHOST
Jordynn and Kaleena gathered by the three small administrative buildings near the main gates of the zoo. Inside the middle building, they knew, a guard sat in front of a wall of monitors, each one showing a different area of the property in flickering black and white. The Specters’ objective: remove the guard from his post to make sure he didn’t spot Blizzard or Little Bighorn escaping.
Kaleena tapped her friend, then pointed to a security camera mounted high on a pole. With a nod, Jordynn headed over to it. The lens stared down at her like the shiny black eye of a robot. She momentarily opened her right pocket and allowed half of her chameleons to crawl inside. The remaining chameleons scattered along her body, but were unable to fully camouflage her. She remained partly visible, a ghostly girl with a thick Afro.
Jordynn took a deep breath. Then she stared into the robot eye on the camera and began to wave her arms back and forth.
CHAPTER 29
THE CROC CRATER
Noah leaned his forehead on the glass and stared down into the Croc Crater. Perhaps thirty feet beneath him, Tank and the three Descenders were spread out across a dirt floor with patches of tall yellow grass. Around them, trees rose and weak waterfalls trickled. Two walls of the pit resembled the walls of a rock
y mountainside.
Tameron looked worse off than the others. He lay with his head in Hannah’s lap. His eyes and mouth were half open, and Hannah was fanning his face with her hand. Sam and Tank were both sitting with their backs against a concrete wall, their heads slumped onto their raised knees.
“I’m sending them,” Evie whispered, and then Noah heard one of her portal pockets unzip. Dozens of chameleons streamed up her leg, across her torso, and then up her arm and onto the trunk of a nearby tree. From there, they scurried along a branch and dropped on the glass roof of the enclosure. Evie grabbed the last chameleon before it got too far and attached a folded piece of paper to its back with a rubber band. Then she sent the chameleon on its way.
The chameleons wiggled through air vents, landing in the treetops. From there, they crawled along the branches, down the trunks, and onto the ground, where they headed for the people they had come to rescue.
When Tank noticed a chameleon crawling on his leg, he raised his hand to swat it, and then stopped his arm in mid-swing.
Sam’s muffled voice came through the glass: “Tank! What’s happening?” Noah saw that the chameleons were ghosting him.
Tank looked up and spotted the chameleons streaming down the tree trunk. Then Noah heard his voice: “It’s them.”
Hannah and Tameron, Noah saw, were also disappearing beneath the chameleon’s magic.
Tank scooped up the chameleon with the message, pulled off the rubber band, and smoothed the page.
“What does it say?” Noah asked Evie.
“‘Get Charlie’s attention.’”
Tank stood, his body beginning to disappear. Then he turned his face toward the heights, and hollered as loud as he could: “Rrraaahhh!” His scream carried cleanly through the vents and out into the Creepy Core.
Within seconds, Charlie Red appeared in the open, torch-lit doorway to the side room, his hair a wild shock of red, his giant freckles spotting his face. He dashed toward the Croc Crater, flattening a few bugs on the way, and then pressed his face against the glass. Peering down, he slid along the glass, moving his head again and again because he couldn’t believe what he saw, which was nothing. His prisoners were gone, or so it seemed. Swearing, Charlie banged a fist on the glass. Then he turned and ran toward the door marked “Lower Level.”
“Let’s go,” Evie whispered to Noah and Ella, and the three of them took off running.
When Charlie pulled back the door, insects were dragged along the floor and heaped into a pile. Evie and the scouts followed on his heels. They quietly pursued him down a curving flight of stairs, Charlie’s footsteps echoing in the hard, hollow space, and then followed him out into a narrow hallway that extended in both directions. Charlie headed left, wound around a curve, and then stopped at a door marked, “Croc Crater.” He peered into the room through a small window.
He cursed again, then unsnapped a key chain from his hip and fumbled with it, the ring and clatter startling a group of spiders. Just as he was about to open the door, he froze and stared through the window, seeming suddenly concerned. Noah willed him to go inside, but he didn’t, and worse, he reached for his walkie-talkie.
But before he could press the button to talk, his head suddenly rocked forward and clunked against the window—Evie’s work, no doubt. His limp body collapsed in a heap, and then Evie dragged him out of the way to pry open the door.
“Evie?” someone inside the room said, and Noah realized it had been Tank.
“It’s me. I got Noah and Ella with me.”
“Guys—let’s go!” Tank said. After a few seconds, Charlie’s legs lifted up by his ankles and then he was dragged into the room.
“Check him for a headset,” Evie said. “And get rid of his walkie-talkie.”
Charlie’s head turned one way, and then the other—Tank was checking his ears. Then his walkie-talkie rose off his hip and smashed to pieces against the floor. A second later, Noah felt Tank brush by him, and then Evie locked the door.
Together, the seven of them escaped up the stairs and gathered in the Creepy Core. One of the Descenders started to groan.
“Shh . . .” someone softly said, and Noah realized it had been Hannah. “Tameron—he’s in a bad way,” she explained. “We’re holding him up—me and Tank.”
Noah heard the rip of a zipper, and then Evie said, “Here.” A pair of boots appeared, and then two leather jackets. Evie handed off the gear, which seemed to float and bob as the Descenders dressed in it. The chameleons quickly made everything disappear.
“What about Tameron’s pack?” Ella whispered.
“Keep it on,” Evie said. “And keep it safe.”
“You got a plan to get out of here?” Tank asked.
“We got a path,” Evie answered. “We saw sasquatches on the way, maybe ten, maybe more. Follow my voice. If I can’t talk, I’ll mark myself. Eight corridors to the front door. Keep quiet and close. One corridor is full of snakes. Once we get beyond that, everything should be easier.”
“Should . . . or will?” Tank asked.
Instead of answering, Evie said, “Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 30
DEGRAFF’S ORDERS
Jonathan DeGraff moved through the corridors on his way to the Creepy Core. A komodo dragon—or what had once been a komodo dragon, the lizard now sick with the Shadowist’s magic and looking more monstrous than ever—was following at his feet, its long tail sweeping aside insects and the glass shards of broken aquariums.
At Legless Lane, DeGraff abruptly stopped when he noticed a faint spot of light. He squatted and picked up a tiny electrical contraption shaped like a bug. The light at its core dimmed . . . and dimmed . . . and then blinked out. He pinched his fingers together and crushed it.
He stood and stared toward the Creepy Core, his hand clenched into a fist. It was them—the Secret Society had gotten in. Had Charlie Red activated the traps?
The darkness between him and the Creepy Core was deep enough for him to surge across, and he sucked back a deep breath, drew the magic of the shadows into his body, and felt himself dissipate. He focused on the end of Legless Lane, stepped forward, and felt an intense speed, as if he were being hurled through space. When his feet came down on the edge of the Creepy Core, the magic released his body all at once, his cells regrouping.
DeGraff surged next to the Croc Crater. He held his hands to one of the glass walls and peered into the pit. Inside was a single person, but not one of the prisoners. Charlie Red lay on the ground, his legs splayed.
The Shadowist slammed the side of his fist against the glass, causing the insects living inside of him to stir. Spindly legs brushed his dry lips as something climbed onto his tongue. He swallowed and felt the insect struggle to stay out of his throat. Then he touched his ear and pressed a button on the same type of headset the scouts and Descenders wore. “It’s me.”
A voice came through the speaker. “Mr. DeGraff?”
“We’ve been infiltrated. Activate the traps.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Mr. Red is down. I need you to alert everyone. Make sure the sasquatches are at their posts. Our visitors have the prisoners, so they’ll be trying to escape.”
“Yes, Mr. DeGraff,” the voice said.
DeGraff glanced over his shoulder at the sight of Charlie again. “Fool,” he grumbled.
Then he turned to Legless Lane and used his magic to get across it in a single step.
CHAPTER 31
RICHIE RISES TO THE OCCASION
Richie was Lee-Lee’s only hope.
The idea made Richie sick, but it also forced him to act. He needed to get the rhino away from the wading pool so he could safely pull Lee-Lee out. But how?
He glanced around the exhibit. The fake mountainside, the caves, the wall of steel bars. What could he do? Thinking of his nerd-gear, he reached into his pocket. His fingers closed on a pencil, a highlighter, a ruler, a penlight, a—
He went back to the penlight and pulled it out. Like the r
est of Richie’s belongings, it was invisible, but his thumb easily found the button to turn it on, and when a tiny beam of light sliced through the darkness, the rhino looked up. It grunt-snorted and took a few steps toward the near end of the pool, its stare locked on the light.
Richie’s heart was hammering in his chest. His gaze moved from the rhino to Lee-Lee. Then he cocked his arm and hurled the penlight, which turned as it sailed through the air, its steady light streaking across the rocky-looking walls and grassy floor. It clinked against a concrete boulder and came to rest on the ground.
The rhino grunted and charged around the pool, its footfalls shaking the exhibit. Richie focused on the water and the wavering image of Lee-Lee. Then he realized he was running when he felt the ground moving beneath him. At the edge of the pool, he dove headfirst, mindful not to go deep. He felt Lee-Lee, wrapped his arms under her torso, and brought her to the surface. Then he waded across the pool and dragged her onto the shore.
“Lee-Lee!” he whispered urgently. “Get up! Wake up!” Her eyes were closed, but she seemed to be breathing.
From the corners of his eyes, Richie saw his penlight go out. He glanced up and realized the rhino had crushed it. Now the powerful animal was looking his way, and Richie realized Lee-Lee wasn’t the only one who had had her chameleons stripped off. The rhino took a slow step, and then another.
Richie glanced over his shoulder. Just a few feet away was the wall of steel bars that protected visitors. When he saw that part of it was sectioned off into a door, he remembered Lee-Lee’s magic key and unclipped it from her hip. Then he jumped to his feet and ran toward the back of the exhibit. Maybe he could open the door and lead the rhino through it—maybe lock the animal outside.
He stopped at the bars, and as he fumbled with the key, the rhino’s footfalls grew louder and louder. Richie didn’t dare look back. His hand steadied and the magic key slipped into the slot. He turned his wrist and heard the lock pop. With only seconds to get out of the way, he pushed through the door and dove out into the visitor area, over to one side. The charging rhino barreled through the doorway right behind him, and the entire building shook as it hurtled through.
