Chapter 40
Rumbles in the Wall

Propped up on his elbows, Richie watched helplessly as the sasquatches neared. In the outside wall behind him, the aquariums suddenly shook. He craned his neck back to see water sloshing and fish darting nervously about.

The wall shook a second time. A third. Water spilled out the tops of the aquariums and cascaded down the glass. The fish swam out of sight and escaped toward the Secret Zoo. The two sasquatches raised their eyes at the commotion. One snorted, spraying snot.

The wall rocked again. And again. Richie watched as cracks formed in the glass—cracks that quickly spread and joined together.

“Uh-oh,” Richie said.

Just as he wrapped his head in his arms, the right side of the shaking wall imploded, and the hall filled with pieces of glass and metal and brick, the debris streaming past him. Water spilled everywhere. Through a cloud of dust lunged two animals that Richie knew. Blizzard and Little Bighorn.

As the rhino landed, his big hooves shattered the tiles. He turned, and with a sideways jerk of his head, scooped up one sasquatch and heaved it up to the ceiling. The monster crashed into the fake goop and then dropped to the floor, unmoving.

Blizzard rammed into the other sasquatch, sank his teeth into its ankle, and slung it against the wall with a pull of his long neck. The monster dropped to the ground. When it tried to raise itself, it immediately collapsed, pieces of glass showering across its back.

Through a gaping hole in the wall, Tank appeared. He kicked through the wreckage and hoisted Richie to his feet. Then he reached out and straightened Richie’s glasses. “Sorry we’re late, bub.”

“Huh?” said a dazed Richie.

“We’re late. Sorry about that. I had to round up a crew.”

Richie had no idea what he was talking about. Richie, in fact, had no real concept of much at the moment. “Crew?”

Tank glanced out the broken wall into the dark night. “Here they come now.”

Richie peered outside. Nothing was there.

“Don’t sweat it. They’re just birds. And you’ve met them before.” He suddenly laid a hand on Richie’s head, palming it like a basketball. “But you’re going to want to duck for this.”

As the big man dropped, pulling Richie along, birds poured in from the open wall, an endless number, of black-capped chickadees. Their wings a fluttery blur, they filled the top half of the hallway, their sheer numbers blotting out the ceiling. Loose feathers rained down, a few of them landing on Tank’s bald head, looking startlingly white against his dark skin. The chickadees swarmed past the girls, who’d dropped to their hands and knees.

In groups of a hundred or more, some birds carried large nets in their tiny talons. Seconds after flying into the building, one group dropped its net on a sasquatch, which thrashed its arms, entangled itself, and fell to the ground. The same pack of chickadess then swooped down and drew in the edges of the net, bundling and twisting their captive, leaving it snarling and biting at the cords.

A second group of chickadees released their net over another sasquatch and repeated the same process. Within seconds, the beast was left growling and writhing on the floor.

Richie looked again at the girls. Covered in chickadee feathers, Ella and Megan were sitting on their knees, cheering. Solana was leaning forward with her forehead pressed against the floor, as if in thankful prayer. Hannah burst a bubble against a broad smile.

The chickadees continued to stream in through the open wall. Down the length of the hall, flashlight fish revealed the action: birds swarming, nets dropping, sasquatches being caught.

As Richie and Tank watched, Tank asked, “Ever dream you’d see chickadees catching something as big and ugly as a sasquatch?”

Richie met his friend’s stare. “Nuh-uh. No way.”

“Well, that’s how we roll, bub.” Tank smiled. “That’s how we roll in the Secret Zoo.”

Richie thought about this. “That’s great. But next time, you think you could roll a little more quickly?”

The big man bellowed with laughter and swatted Richie’s shoulder, nearly knocking him down.

Richie straightened and looked around. Things weren’t over, not yet. Alligators were still escaping. And the gateway to the Secret Creepy Critters needed to be closed.

Thinking of the latter, Richie peered over at the middle waterfall in Gator Falls. There was still no sign of Noah or Podgy.