Millie was so excited when she'd first gotten hired at the zoo. A 26-year-old recent-ish bio grad, it was her dream to work as a zookeeper. As a child, she was glued to various biology magazines, plushies, and realistic figurines. As she grew older and went through the university system, she spent countless hours researching every animal she could imagine, trawling the depths of her university's library and online resources for any information she could find. When graduation came she hardly believed it. She interned at the zoo quite a bit during her undergrad, and considered getting a masters in biology. After taking a gap year (or two) to see some of her favorite animals in real life, she returned to her home state renewed and invigorated to start her career, with further study looming in the back of her mind.
Since she was a trained SCUBA diver, the zoo gave her experience with every animal under their care, including in their aquarium. She spent time with elephants, bears, sharks, tortoises, penguins, even some exotic cats and seals the zoo had for seasonal exhibits Her wide-ranging interest in biology proved invaluable to the zoo. She never quite developed a favorite, spending time with and getting to know as many of the animals as she could. She enjoyed teaching visiting school groups about the animals, helping students unlock the same passion for biology that she had when she was a child. Some the zoo animals took quite a liking to her, finding her more patient and generous than some of her coworkers.
However, nothing could have prepared her for the Fusion Wave. It was a quiet Tuesday morning. Clear skies, a pleasant temperature, and a light breeze coursed through her hair. The weather could not have been better for doing the morning rounds. The alert popped up on her phone, the warning sirens blaring overhead. Something was wrong, very wrong, but it was too late. She had hardly looked at her phone when there was a flash of red on the horizon, and it immediately engulfed the sky. With it came a blinding heat as biology, physics, the foundational rules of life and the universe itself were briefly rewritten. As soon as it began, it was over, but the aftereffects had just begun. And she found herself at the epicenter of it all, a victim of the Fusion Wave in the center of a zoo...