Chris walked out from one the staff entrees and entered the part of the zoo open to the public, it was still semi-dark, not dark enough to need the street lights which stood on top of poles which lined almost all the paths in the zoo but still dark enough for long shadows to cover parts of the path. In truth the having so many poles was kind of pointless but it allowed the zoo to put up a bunch of Christmas lights up in the winter and get the public to come in a less visited time of year.
That was still a few months off but there was a chill of early fall in the air as summer neared its end.
The zoo wasn’t open yet, so he was able to walk around with his cup of coffee in hand, most of the time, keepers walked around with coffee or bottles of water. They weren’t supposed to but no one complained and the high ups had more to worry about then a guest seeing a keeper drink some coffee, water or possible other stuff.
“Morning.” Said Chris to a few of the overnight staff, they were heading in while he was heading out.
He entered the main central area of the zoo, there where some smaller animal keeps here but mostly it was food and shopping area with a large central pound with a couple statues of different animals in and around it.
That is when something started to feel off, the area seamed emptier then normal. By now, one could smell the cooks starting to make the small mountain of food for guests who liked to come in the morning. The mornings where when the people who understood what animals where liked did come, the animals where most active either in the morning or evenings and slept during the day. Still right now, Chris couldn’t smell the food being cooked.
He walked past a couple of tables outside a quick service area, normally there would be one or two people putting the chairs down before the doors opened but some of them were knocked over and spread across the ground.
“Weird.” Stated Chris as he kept moving toward his area, walking around the lake he noticed that it was strangely quiet.
He was about to make his final turn, passing by a bathroom before he entered the area when suddenly a pair of arms came up from behind him and wrapped him up.
“Morning Chris.” Said a voice in your ear.