by Meghan Dodson

He stumbles through the hot humid Forest, and pounces, suddenly he hits glass, “OW!” He exclaimed, 

he heard a voice, “Cobra! There you are! I was looking for you.” He looked up, it was dust, his antelope friend, Cobra looked up, feeling like he just slammed his whole body on the ground.

He replied “Oh, sorry about that Dust, Just practicing.” With his face scrunched like he smelled rotten carcass from 20 feet away. “A-Are you okay?” Dust looked puzzled. “Yeah, I’m fine.” He replied. “But a story right now sounds great”.

 Cobra’s mom is a great storyteller, well, Cobra thinks so at least… But she wasn’t born here, in the zoo, she was born in the actual real life savana. “Mom? Can you tell dust and me a story please?” Cobra begged. 

Unfortunately the little furball didn’t have all four limbs, he was missing his left  arm, but he was born with it so he’s used to it. And he was thrilled to hear his mom purr yes. He leaped in the air with joy, only to see the furless things staring at him.

 Dust said, “please come over here, I can’t hear you.” So Cobra and his mom walked over by the glass and settled down. Dust’s mom came over and asked what was happening. Dust said with a smile “Cobra’s Mom is gonna tell us a story about the wild!” She said “Alright, have fun then.” his mom said, Dust replied “We will!”

=

Claw started to talk, “So, what would you like to hear about?” Cobra and Dust glanced at each other and said almost at the same time, “We would like you to tell us about how you survived!” They smiled at each other. 

“Alright then, I was strolling through the grass with my mom, and we spotted a pride of lions.” The two both gasped in terror. “REALLY?!?! WHAT HAPPENED???” Claw gave a “Can I talk please” kind of face, “We tried backing away, but a female lion saw the grass move, we ran as fast as we could once she roared and leaped down from her rock and started sprinting, I wasn’t fast enough and she almost caught me but my mom leaped backward and lashed at her, that just made her more mad, my mom picked me up and started to run again. We ran and ran until we saw a large tree. We were lucky that the lion didn’t try to climb the tree, and that we even saw one, we were in the middle of the savannah, it’s kind of hard to find trees sometimes. We were also almost out of breath, so we stayed for the night, hoping the lions would go away. The next morning we were starved and dehydrated, we needed food and water fast, So my mom grabbed me and we walked to a watering hole and drank some water, then, we saw an antelope, he looked really tasty, no offense dust,” “Dust said no worries” claw continued on, “my mom and I were creeping up on him, suddenly, my mom leaped really high and caught grip of the antelope, the antelope’s eyes widened and he started to buck and run, my mom held tight, I was running as fast a I could but I couldn’t keep up with a full grown male antelope, so they ran off into the distance, I was left, alone. I heard a *vrrrrrrrrr* sound, and the humans caught me in a net put me in a cage and drove off. I roared as loud as I could, luckily my mom heard me, she came bounding down the savannah, but the thing was too fast, and I was stuck there, in a cage, with a ton of other animals. That’s when I met your mother dust, we grew best friends, and when we grew up, we both had you on the same day, cobra, you are 2 ⅓ minutes older than dust. And you two are great friends now. It’s weird to humans to think of a tiger and an antelope to be friends but it’s not much different that a baby tiger is named cobra, and a baby antelope to be named dust. The end.” Claw finished. 

The two thanked her and claw walked off to a shady spot in the tree and settled down to take a nap. Dust whispered “I wanna see what the actual real life savannah is like!” “Yeah, me too.” Cobra agreed. “Hmmm, what’s that word, you know the one that means to get out of something without other things noticing until they do?” Dust asked. “You mean escape?” Cobra said. “That’s the one!” Dust replied. “Wait, wait, wait, let me get this straight, you want to ESCAPE!?!” Cobra said pretty loud that his mom could’ve heard. 

Dust said “Yeah, why not? What if we try?” “Okay.” Cobra said slowly.

 That night cobra was woken by an excited voice, “Cobra! Cobra!” The voice called. Cobra would have sworn it was a nightmare, but no, it was Dust, just waiting for him to wake up. “What? He said his eyes felt like they were going to close again, but Dust was far too excited. “Uh, what?!? We’re going to escape, remember?” Dust said sharply. “Oh, oh yeah, I forgot.” Cobra said falling asleep again. “COBRA!” Dust said immediately “What?!” He roared, “Watch me,” dust said proudly, Dust ran and sprung, he was over the fence, “HOW DID YOU DO THAT!?!” Cobra said loudly. “I have no idea!! Now c’mon” he said anxiously, “Okay, okay “Cobra said shaking his head, still half asleep, he glanced at his mom and gave her a guilty face, he ran, and leaped, he was over the fence too. “Wow, I had no Idea I could do this” he said happily, he was definitely awake now. They walked cautiously down the concrete road thingy, cobra kept shhhing dust for his hooves, “Sorry” dust kept saying.

 They walked past the giraffes and the flamingos and the gorillas dust kept looking sadly at all the enclosures they passed. Cobra looked at him, “We’ll come back for them,” Cobra said kindly. “Okay,” dust lowered his head. After they passed the lions, “Why do lions always get to be in the front?” Cobra said in an angry tone. “Would you rather have hairless things staring at us all the time?” Dust said with a tone cobra couldn’t even recognize. “Yeah, you’re right.” Cobra finally said with a sigh, they reached the end. 

“FINA-“ Cobra realized the doors were locked. Cobra just stood there with his mouth open. Dust glared at him like a kind of, “Are you stupid?” Face. Cobra just made a “Whatever” face back and moved on. Cobra Finally blurted “Hey! Maybe I could try and climb this awful black thing with tiny holes so only birds and rats and all those things to get in.” Dust looked at him with a “No, no, no, no, no, you are absolutely definitely totally STUPID.” Kind of face. Dust Replied like he was some sort of crazy person running around the zoo, “ “ARE YOU INSANE!?!? You are NOT! I repeat, NOT! Going up there!!!!” “It’ll be fiiiine, you worry too much. It’s not good for you.” Cobra observed proudly. Dust gave him a face like “You’re gonna kill yourself” look, Cobra ignored it, and started to climb.

“WOW! You can really see the city from up here!!!” Cobra pointed out loudly, “I don’t know if that’s a good thing, or a bad thing” Dust said, taking a few steps back and throwing his ears back with a worried expression. “Wait, How are you gonna get down?” Dust said worriedly, “Uhhhhh, I didn’t think of that” Cobra said with a gulp. “Oh eat you’re hooves! You’re kidding me!” Dust said in an awfully loud screeching voice. “I told you it was a bad idea!” 

Cobra glared down at him with the best bullet eye he could do. And flicked his tail in an angry expression. After a few minutes dust had a stupid idea, “What if you jumped down—“ “NO! I’m not jumping down!” Cobra roared, “That’s like telling me to run from a lion pride for fun!” Dust shushed him “Let me finish! I’ll CATCH you!” Dust bleated, “Oh! That could work!” Cobra nodded, “Wait, do you hear that?” Dust replied nervously, “Hear wh— Oh, wait, I think I do.”

 Cobra almost stepped back on the gate, and almost fell off but luckily he just stepped on the big concrete wall instead. “Ahhh!!” He roared, “COBRA!” Dust yelled, The humans were already there. Because they both saw the lights bumping up and down, “No time, RUUUN!!!” Cobra yelled. 

it was pretty much balanced, because Dust was faster than cobra and for sure can lose a human, but not cobra, especially because of his disability. But he was running on the concrete high up, and Dust had to get past all the trees on the side of the wall. “What do we do now?!” Dust said with a yelp. 

“Turn around! As sharp as you can, then bash into the humans with your horns—“ “But my horns aren’t fully grown yet!” Dust interrupted, “No, you didn’t let me finish then run as fast as you can, then you’ll be so fast with you’re horns that it’ll at least but them out of the way, then we can find the keys to the gate— Actually, let’s free our friend first, then we can get the monkeys to open the gates, because they can reach through the bars and grab the keys unlock their cage, help us free everyone, they open the gate, and we find a way to get everyone home! I know it’s a very long plan, but we can figure something out, right?” Cobra said, trying to gasp, “We can try!” Dust said at the top of his lungs.

“Alright” Dust swung his head forward as he twisted heavily around to face the astounded guards, Dust put a lot more kick into his sprint and pounded the guards with his small horns, “Now quick! Find the keys!” Cobra yelled gasping for air, “Glot Em’!!!!” Dust attempted to say with a mouthful of keys. “Good, let’s go.” Cobra said in his normal non-tired voice. “Pop on!” Dust said sternly, “Thanks, I need this” Cobra held tight.

“The monkeys should be around here somewhere, I would have sworn we were in the primate section…” Cobra said confused, Tkkkk tkkkii sssski eeeeiii! What the heck was that!?!?” Cobra whispered in a frightened voice, EEEEEEEIIIIIIII!!!  “The monkeys!” Cobra observed knocking himself in the head in an embarrassed way, “ONWARD!!!” Cobra roared,

“Hi, Edward is it?” Cobra asked politely to the monkey, “Yes, Sir. Edward actually, “Oh, pardon me, Sir. Edward, do you mind unlocking all the cages?” Cobra asked again. “Why not? Sure I can.” Sir. Edward unlocked his cage and said, “Brothers! Sisters! Come!!!” “Shhhhh!!!” Cobra suggested.

“So, what next?” Sir. Edward asked politely. “We free the giraffes, elephants, Jaguars, gorillas, everyone. Even the lions”…. cobra said in an amused voice. “Ok” Sir. Edward replied. Cobra started with the other animals first. “sir. Edward, please open all the animals “”Ok” sir. Edward said again. And unlocked all the animals before cobra’s mom and the other tiger with her daughter Lilly. 

Cobra played with her sometimes when he was bored, he thought she was kinda annoying. Her mother was carrying her in her mouth, then set her down. “What is this all about!?!” Liilly’s mom said with a growl, “Chill out” Claw hissed 

“Where is Ruby?” Lilly’s mom called out. A tiger with bright  reddish-Orange fur with stripes and black as midnight slithered out from the dark part of the cave, Cobra had only seen Ruby once, she was a few years from full grown and a great fighter and climber.

“What’s going on” Ruby growled as she glared at all the animals, the elephants had wide eyes and the zebras were shaking. She Walked right over to Cobra, “what?” She said again “U-Uhhhhhh…” Cobra was stiff and was scared to continue. Instead, he ran, Edward was on his back screaming. His fur was standing on end and Cobra realized that he was headed for the gate. He turned around sharpley and didn’t know what to do, all the animals started to follow him so he decided that he would ask Dust to hand Edward the keys, Edward was fast and panicking. “AHHHHHH!!!!!!” He screamed “WHY WON’T THIS STUPID KEY WORK!!!!!!” He screamed again, until Ch-Chkgk and the gates were open.

Cobra studied his surroundings and he gestured to the other animals that it was safe to go. After a while, of course, the police spotted them and the lions said they would take care of it. They roared and slashed and easily caught up with the rest. They twisted and turned through the city and found an airport at 12:49 AM all the animals were excited but kept the excitement at a slow pace. They reached an airplane and boarded it, The apes were in the front fidgeting with the controls until the accidentally ejected a mouse, an eagle caught it and flew it back down to the plane.

One of the rhinos said “when are you going to do something good for a change?” She stampeded up to the front and her horn pressed a button that said Take off and she took off into the morning sky. 

By the time the plane was steady it was already 2:37 AM and while they were flying over the South Pole, the penguins said “Goodbye! Until another time!” And slid down into their Ivey home. Then they flew over china, the pandas Said “Chow!” And rolled down into their Green Forest. Then the drove over Canada, North Pole, Mexico, North America, Aisia, and then the savanna. Cobra said goodbye and the rest of the animals emptied the plane but stayed close, if they ever needed the plane again, Cobra got to meet his grandmother, Ruby found a nice place to scowl, and the elephants, and the rhinos, and everyone, even the antelopes. Dust and cobra discovered so many new things, together.

About the author

Meghan Dodson lives in Sanfrancisco with her parents, sister, and her hamster. She loved animals a lot which is what inspired her to write about animals. She also really likes to draw, like, anything really, mostly dragons though. She likes to go camping and ride her bicycle around. She will practice more at writing in the future.