Lippe Simone - Blank

The main path split into a service road at the crossroads and the road was closed by a chain-link gate and a sign, “zoo staff only”. Honor raised the shovel and released the clutch and dragged the fence down the service road until the exterior wall of the gorilla enclosure was in view. At that point the rock and adobe wall is perhaps twenty feet high so she knew to raise the blade as high as it would go and approach only as fast as first gear would allow, which is roughly the walking speed of an old man looking for an address.

The bulldozer was stopped by a brief test of strength between machine and wall which machine soon won. The top half of the wall tumbled into the shovel and the bulldozer climbed over the remaining rubble and into the gorilla reserve. The gorillas seemed surprised to see her and responded as gorillas always will when confronted with a bulldozer, which is largely indistinguishable from their response to the sudden appearance of any heavy construction machinery. She waved them an emotional goodbye as she flattened the gate to the public area of the zoo.

Honor pulled the front off the orangutan's tree house pavilion and drove through the front and out the back of the elephant enclosure. The lion watched his front doors bend in with a lethargic confidence, as though it was an expected development of passing interest, which he would address later. In fact few of the animals took immediate advantage of their freedom as Honor pushed in the bars of the leopard cage and tipped a palm tree into the tiger’s deep pen, forming a convenient gangway.

Honor was on top of the world. No one tried to stop her, no one seemed to see her or the massive bulldozer she was riding as she released or tried to release the giraffes, the rhinoceros and the chimpanzees, who provided the greatest satisfaction as they immediately seized the opportunity to mingle with the tourists and occupy the food concessions.

A large-scale zoo escape is hot, heavy work on the best of days and today was hotter and heavier than most. So after collapsing the wall of the aviary to release a squawking cloud of exotic birds Honor turned off the engine and listened to the jungle cacophony she’d created. Tired and dusty and thirsty but filled with the elation of a job well done, she hopped off the bulldozer and took a bottle of water from a peanut vendor who seemed to be just at that moment becoming distantly aware that he was covered in monkeys.

Honor drank deeply and when she lowered the bottle she was looking upon the rule of unintended consequences. An elegant Sumatran Tiger was stalking a motionless herd of Japanese tourists with soft and silent and wholly unnecessary stealth. Honor scouted the exits, spotted the parking lot, and escaped the zoo. She had no memory of having had to deal with consequences but she felt certain that she didn’t like them, and in any case she was bored now and anxious to find another way to profit from her position as the only conscious person alive.

The parking lot was remarkably undersubscribed for a major tourist attraction but of greater disappointment to Honor was the uninterrupted collection of mini-vans and people carriers and station wagons with artificial wood panels that people bring to the zoo. Conscious of the urgency building and roaring and screeching behind her she was about to settle on a yellow Range Rover for no better reason than a parrot had perched on it when she spotted the ideal ride to navigate a city-wide car accident — a black and candy-apple red Harley Davidson Electra Glide stood alone and illegal in the shade of the picnic area.

She was stripping a wire from the brake light of the bike to use as a jumper when a distinctively human scream punctuated a sudden and total end to the entire orchestra from within the zoo and all was silence. Honor froze by instinct or because a lioness was walking from the zoo exit with the leisurely confidence that often accompanies four inch fangs and five inch claws.

Honor continued her work crouched behind the motorcycle while the lioness sniffed the air and twitched her ears. Drawn by the shade or the scent of prey or an interest in motorcycles, the massive cat approached. Honor was the picture of still waters, utterly motionless on top while her hands worked frantically and blindly to bridge the ignition wire. She couldn’t bring herself to look down to verify her work and she knew that there was an exactly fifty percent chance that she’d bridged the wrong circuit or, put another way, the odds were two to one that she was about to be eaten.

Good odds and time was up anyway. Honor stood and faced the lion and pressed the ignition button and nothing happened. Or any rate, the motorcycle didn’t respond. The lioness did. She stopped and gave Honor the sort of quizzical look that a heavy-weight boxer might give when called a sissy by an old man on crutches. Then she braced her shoulders and bared her teeth and coiled her muscles for a decisive leap.

With the rapidity of a flip book Honor visualized her options and all of them concluded with her being eaten by a lion. There was no shelter nor distraction nor weapon. There was just the motorcycle. She smiled at the lioness in a manner that she hoped would convey that it was she who was responsible for the freedom the animal now enjoyed. The lion appeared unappreciative but still didn’t leap. Only her ears moved. Something had distracted her in Honor’s final seconds on earth.

Then Honor heard it too. A growing mechanical wheeze like the sound of steam escaping was coming from all directions. It was a jet, flying very low and apparently evocative of some dark memory of lions in captivity. The jet burst into view and, with a parting glance that suggested that Honor was guilty of unsportsmanlike behavior, the lioness shot away across the parking lot.

Honor was grateful for the intrusion but peripherally aware that it brought different consequences. A jet meant people. Conscious people who doubtless have firm views on the proper use of rental Ferraris and bulldozers. Honor set about correctly hotwiring the motorcycle and placing herself in a position from which she could reasonably claim ignorance of anything untoward that might have happened at the Los Angeles Zoo that afternoon.

But then the sound stopped. Honor looked up to watch the passenger jet enter a powerless glide and dive out of view toward the ocean. She was once again the only conscious person on earth.

Riding a motorcycle is its own sort of freedom. Riding a Harley Davidson at top speed on the sidewalks of downtown Los Angeles without a helmet moments after narrowly escaping death by lion is a sense of liberty very nearly approaching flight. Honor flew now toward the coast, guided vaguely by a need to drive a train or steal a yacht or eat caviar with her hands.

The city was different from Honor’s short memory of it. It was still gridlocked and silent but there was movement now among the people on the streets. Tentative groups were loosely forming and some even gave the appearance of a wary sentience. Mostly, though, if they had any interest at all it was in raiding the fruit and vegetable stalls on the sidewalks of Chinatown or the scattered and sparse and understocked grocery stores Honor passed along Broadway as she entered the theater district.

This wasn’t looting, though. It was more like grazing on fruits and flowers and unwrapped bubblegum and cigars and whatever else might confused for food by the debutant consumer. The citizenry was docile and unthreatening and gave the impression of a Disney movie placed in a Los Angeles populated entirely by orphaned baby deer. If there was any sign of menace it was in the subtle sameness of the little herds — some tall blond men in golfware or, quite possibly, clown costumes had assumed control of a delicatessen next door to a café under the administration of a dozen hare krishnas. Across the street four or five motorcycle cops had been joined by two security guards to occupy a candy store. The effect was subtly disturbing and suggestive of some developing peril but the only explicit effect was to make Honor realize that she was hungry.