"I'm afraid he has a very strict policy against allowing apes on the premises."
Agent Johnson kept his badge out. "And I might have to respect that if I'm ever here again, For now though, I think you'll have to agree an exception needs to be made."
The panther quickly considered his options. Most likely he was here about the missing girls. No real need to worry there, but turning him away would be far too suspicious, and there were greater concerns at the moment. "You have quite a point, but I'm afraid the Minotaur is away at the moment."
"Is he now? When do you expect him back?"
"I wouldn't know. He left just this morning, in quite the hurry, without any explanation to anyone on staff."
"I see," Agent Johnson replied, no doubt thinking how difficult a time the Minotaur would have not being spotted if he fled the inevitable charges. "Well, as it so happens, your employer is wanted for questioning with regards to a number of very serious allegations. Would you mind if I came in and had a look around while we wait?"
The panther stopped him when he started to pull forth the relevant paperwork. "I had no idea! Right this way."
It seemed a change of plans was called for. Originally, the plan was to coerce the Minotaur into selling his shares of the company to someone of a properly predatory persuasion, and then arrange for him to disappear. Of course, if he could be made to take the fall for the abduction charges, maybe some of the other shady dealings going on, that would serve the same purpose. Of course, for it to be believable, he'd have to disappear a bit earlier than expected. After escorting the agent to the Minotaur's study, he excused himself, getting on the radio to explain this latest development and look into sneaking the Minotaur out to join his earlier guests. There was some risk involved, but this place wasn't called the labyrinth for nothing.
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Tasha was less than pleased to hear about these backups. Standard procedure for this sort of investigation was to seize all available records, in order to check for any discrepancies. "And exactly where are these backups located?" she asked.
"There's a server room down in the basement."
Of course there was. She could understand how Sherman had missed that under the circumstances, but she'd have to ask Johnson how he'd managed to drop the ball on this so badly. Not much to be done about it now though. "OK, here's what we're going to do. We are going to bring one of these chambers back online, but absolutely no one is to touch any of these computers or whatever other hardware is involved here without a law enforcement officer breathing down the back of their neck and making sure everything is above board. However, nobody is entering or leaving this part until I'm sure they have nothing to do with whatever it is that's going on here. Clearly, whatever security protocols you currently have in place aren't cutting it.
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Agent Sherman waited a few moments for the shouting to fade out. What was wrong with these local cops that people could just walk right up to their interrogation room like that?
"Well James," he said. "Contrary to what your friend there was saying, I think you and I both know that you've been a very bad dog." Goldie sank down in her chair at this, whimpering again. This was proving quite cathartic for Sherman after getting jerked around at the park yesterday. "I'll be curious to see how all this business about falsified records plays out, some other friends of yours may have to answer for that, but you're definitely going to be hauled up before a judge for all this business with Max." Sherman was on thin ice with that bit, but it was technically true. She was definitely a witness that would be called in for his trial. "For now though, you're going to just sit right there and think about whether there's anything else you'd like to confess to while we work out how long we're going to keep you here at the pound."
Sherman glanced at the pair of huskies by the entrance who'd caused that outburst earlier. That was a conversation he wasn't looking forward to having. For now though, it was going to be hard enough running this plan by the local cops.
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Naomi pushed Charlotte away again. Just what the hell was she thinking here? In all the time she'd known her, she hadn't shown the slightest interest in men, but here she was clearly trying to make out with him for reasons beyond 'distracting their observers.' She'd even put a hand on that... Unwelcome Growth he had. If he were still a woman, he might be willing to ignore all the onlookers and just have at it. If anything she was even more attractive like this than when she'd been a wolf after all. Not like this though, not as a MAN. Besides which, something else was going on. The people observing them were all heading upstairs for some reason, and a concealed hatch had just swung open from beneath the sand by the wall. Clearly something was going on here, but what? Was it a rescue? An accident? Some weird sort of test? Odds were it wouldn't be open long, unless they had something to jam it in place... but did they even want it to be open?
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"I can see where you're coming from, but we have separate holding cells for men and women. That's not a policy we violate under any circumstances."
"Well," Agent Sherman said, "we live in interesting times. According to every piece of documentation anyone has available, the dog in that room over there is a man."
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Mark's announcement didn't sit well with everyone else on staff, and a bit of an argument ensued over whether he had the right to let some of the subjects free without consulting anyone. Still, he had a point. If there was a federal investigation about human rights violations at the park, it wasn't a question of if someone would be looking into their work, it was when. Most decided they'd rather risk an arrest and just play dumb as well as they could, particularly from the security staff, but a few felt a bit adventurous. One researcher insisted the safest option was to shut themselves in with the other subjects. Nobody would suspect it, and it wasn't exactly hard to fake being a homeless bum with no I.D. "Besides," she said, "with how well that mermaid form worked out, I've been wanting to try on a snake tail." That logic won over a fair number of the others.
The only person willing to follow Mark's plan to flee the country by air was Tran Nguyen. "I think this plan of yours is completely nuts, but I've spent too long working on that template to let you sneak off and take all the credit. If we're going to do this though, I want a full test, not that winged mammal compromise I saw you working on before. I want to observe the psychological effects of becoming a true egg-laying species."
"Wow Tran, I never figured you for the type."
"Don't get ahead of yourself there. I said I wanted to observe it. Since you're the one forcing us to flee the country and give up that nice fat nest egg we were all promised, I figure it's only fair you provide some new ones."
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"Finally," Katerina thought, as the chamber finished its work and she re-familiarized herself with the notion of wearing clothes. Given her status as a repeat visitor, and frankly, someone who could sue their pants off, she'd been one of the first to be released from the park once one of the gate's reopened. Being a rabbit seemed to help too. She hadn't exactly been in the position to interfere with any of the park's usual operations given the fears that came with the form, and there were certainly plenty of people to confirm where she'd been at any given moment. Given how hard a time others were having though, she had a feeling she'd be back here soon enough.
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The Stags were at a bit of a loss over what they were supposed to do now. Chad was no longer one of them, and the top stag of the tournament just got carried off on a stretcher. Did they restart the tournament to pick a new champion? Get revenge on that Jeremy guy? Clearly, they all had to pay him their respects, but he hadn't fought his way all the way to the top, and didn't really seem too interested in the title besides. Eventually though, it dawned on them that he hadn't kept the doe he wandered off with last night, and the one Vinny had claimed for himself was up for grabs again too. With how much that fight had worked them up, working out the new pecking order didn't seem like too big a priority for the time being.