At more or less the exact moment that Todd slipped out into the hallway behind the reptile cages, a female zoo worker stopped suddenly and stared at him in surprise.
“H-Hey!” She called, reaching for her radio. “W-What are you doing back here, buddy?”
“Uh!” Todd stalled for time, reaching for his remote, “Im your new janitor!” He lied.
“What?” The zookeeper looked at him incredulously. “Bullshit!” She reached for her radio and Todd sighed heavily.
He hit the emergency button and time itself suddenly stopped dead. There was a strange droning noise around him as all of existence took a break except for himself. Todd stared at the zookeeper reaching for her radio and shrugged as he scanned her with his remote.
Female, 26, human. Kind of boring after his experiences with Gretta, he decided. Ah, but wait, he had a sudden realization. He couldn’t let this woman give him away, and at the same time he realized that Gretta was now missing.
Todd brought up his crocodile’s original unaltered scan and chuckled slightly as he applied it to the zookeeper in full. He then let time start again.
The zookeeper suddenly dropped her radio to the ground and went stiff as a board as alien sensations shot down her spine. Her skin began to green, her hair began to shrink back, and the buttons on her shirt began to tear apart as her torso thickened.
Todd watched with amazement as the poor woman lost all humanity in a matter of seconds. Her clothing fell apart, her face contorted into shock and pain as it crunched and lengthened out, and while moments prior there had been a woman, there was now a perfect copy of aged plump original Gretta.
The crocodile stared at the floor in a fog, mind starting to collapse, and Todd took the opportunity to quickly shrink her down to a tiny size. Something he could carry.
The crocodile let out a grumble as she shrank down to mere inches of her former length, and barely had a moment to react as Todd plucked her off the concrete floor. The tiny former zookeeper struggled now, clapping tiny jaws and kicking and flailing by her tail as Todd quickly journeyed to the crocodile cage and undid the locked door. He put the new crocodile in and quickly slammed and locked the door, reversing her shrinkage on the remote and backing away as an angry former human bellowed and slammed her heavy body into the locked door.
Todd checked his remote one more time as he quickly gathered the ruined clothes and radio and stuffed them in his bag along with Gretta. The new crocodile’s mental state was deteriorating, and in a few moments there would be no human left in the animal at all.
Todd felt slightly bad, but was pleased with the results. The hapless zookeeper’s transformation would ensure nobody would miss Gretta. He thought of this, patted the lunch bag gently, and quickly made for the exit.
Todd left the reptile house without incident and made for the parking lot and the bus to his apartment.